The National Assembly for Wales’ Children and Young People’s Committee wants a single way of looking at how much money is spent on Welsh children and how well that money is used.
Their report recommends a single way of reporting this expenditure so that cost benefit analysis can measure its effectiveness.
It recommends that children’s budgeting statements should be produced every third financial year to demonstrate the outcome of expenditure.
“By putting such budgetary analyses into the public domain through saying ‘we had £X million, this is how we spent it, this is what we hoped would happen, and this is what did happen,’ we believe effective governments can earn public confidence and trust,” said Committee Chair Helen Mary Jones AM.
“A Government could have the best stated policy in the world, but if we do not know where the resources are going, we will not be able to trace whether the investment has been made.
“Ultimately, for Governments to demonstrate what their real priorities are, we need to be able to follow the money.
The report says that Wales is the only country in the UK whose government has initiated work in this field and states that, by the Government’s own admission, it is still early for budgetary analysis.
But it states that resources allocated at a national and local level for Children’s Budgeting need to be examined and a more joined-up approach with Local Authorities needs to be adopted.
