Presentation by Veronique Fouque at the 10th annual meeting of the Senior Budget Officials Performance and Results Network held on 24-25 November 2014. Find more information at http://www.oecd.org/gov/budgeting

1. OECD 10th annual meeting
Performance and results network
Paris, 24 & 25 November 2014
Performance budgeting: the French experience
Véronique FOUQUE, Head of the performance
departement, Budget Directorate, Ministry of Finance

2. The agenda 2
1. The changes provided by the new law
2. Implementation
A new chain of responsibility
A simplified framework for performance
3. Limits and perspectives

3. The changes provided by the new law (2006) 3
A more exhaustive budget
An increased disclosure including
analytical justifications, operators
information, …
More reliable accounts
Accounts based on 3 levels :
budgetary, general, costs analysis
Clarity and
transparency
Public policies are organised and
presented around « programs »
A results-oriented budget
For each « program » : a strategy,
objectives, and indicators
A renewed public management

4. 4 Transparency in the State’s budget
http://www.performance-publique.budget.gouv.fr
Transversal
items
Budgetary
documents
Newsletter
Public finances data

5. The agenda 5
1. The changes provided by the new law
2. Implementation
A new chain of responsibility
A simplified framework for performance
3. Limits and perspectives

6. 6
More transparency in the State budget’s framework
The 2015 State general budget
Others
Operating
expenditures
Intervention
expenditures
Capital
expenditures
Debt payment
Staff
expenditures
Financial
expenditures
The framework
31 missions
Education
Defence
Innovation
Home and Skills
Office
Public affairs
management Work and
Social Affairs
Housing
Environment,
Energy
Foreign
Office
Culture
Justice
pensions
Others
122 programs
573 actions

7. 7
The program directors and the operational managers :
key players in the chain of responsability
Management practices to serve public policies
■ The Program director (RPROG) is the core player of the new public management process ; he makes
a link between political and management responsabilities
■ The Program director delegates the program management to operational budget officers (BOP) who
themselves allocate resources between the operational units (UO)
A key point is to feed this network and make operational practices performance-oriented
A Program centralizes
the credits for one or
many action(s)
The Program’s
Operational Budget is
the operational variation
of the program at a local
level (territory, action…)
The Operational Unit is
the application « on the
field » of the BOP
RPROG
BOP BOP
UO UO
Central
level
Central
Deconcentrated
level
122 programs in 2015
about 2000 BOP :
- 300 central
- 1700 deconcentrated :
- 160 inter-regions,
- 1200 regions
- 300 departments

8. 8
Example: General Directorate for Employment and
Professional Training
■ Simple and strong scoreboards for decision-making

9. The agenda 9
1. The changes provided by the new law
2. Implementation
A new chain of responsibility
A simplified framework for performance
3. Limits and perspectives

10. Simplify the performance framework 10
■ Within the 2015 - 2017 triennal budget procedure the Budget Directorate
has wished to :
– Make the performance framework more meaningful: strengthen the link with
the public policies strategies and the selected objectives and indicators
– Make the performance framework more understandable for the Parliament
representatives
Improve the « mission » level
– The mission indicators have to be more significant and synthetic
– Give priority to the indicators that allow an international benchmarking
when relevant and possible
Keep only (mainly) performance indicators (instead of activity indicators)

11. 11
Performance indicators
A set of indicators that has been improved over time
Between 2014 and 2015 :
-17% objectives, -19% indicators
46%
35%
19%
Efficiency for the citizen
Quality of service
Efficiency for the taxpayer

12. 12
Example : the « Justice » mission – Program # 166
Program #166 as of 2014 framework: « judiciary justice »
OBJECTIVE # 1 : Issue quality judgments in Civil Matters within reasonable delay
Indicator P166.1.1 : Average delay for processing cases by type of Court
Indicator P166.1.2 : Percentage of courts for which the processing delay is 1 month above the average
Indicator P166.1.3 : Average age of “work-in-progress” cases by type of court
Indicator P166.1.4 : Rate of cassation for the civil judgments
Indicator P166.1.5 : Number of civil cases processed per judge or per legal adviser (in full-time equivalent worked)
Indicator P166.1.6 : Number of cases processed per civil servant (in full-time equivalent worked)
OBJECTIVE # 2 : Issue judgments in Criminal Matters within reasonable delay
Indicator P166.2.1 : Average delay for processing criminal cases
Indicator P166.2.2 : Rate of rejection by the national criminal record
Indicator P166.2.3 : Rate of cassation for the criminal judgments
Indicator P166.2.4 : Number of cases processed per public prosecutor (in full-time equivalent)
Indicator P166.2.5 : Number of criminal cases processed per judge or per legal adviser (in full-time equivalent)
OBJECTIVE # 3 : Extend and diversify the answer in Criminal Matters and improve the judgments enforcement
Indicator P166.3.1 : Rate of response in Criminal Matters
Indicator P166.3.2 : Rate of alternative response (sentences management)
Indicator P166.3.3 : Rate of judgments enforcement
Indicator P166.3.4 : Average delay of judgments enforcement
OBJECTIVE # 4 : Control the increase of procedures costs
Indicator P166.4.1 : Average cost per criminal case
OBJECTIVE # 5 : Develop the use of electronic communication
Indicator P166.5.1 : Number of visioconferences

13. 13
Example : the « Justice » mission – Program # 166
Program #166 as of 2015 framework: « judiciary justice »
Adjustment of
indicators titles
Creation of
New indicators
OBJECTIVE # 1 : Improve the quality and effectiveness of the justice administration
Indicator 1.1 : Average delay for processing the civil procedures apart from the short-time procedures
Indicator 1.2 : Percentage of courts for which the processing delay is 15% above the average target
Indicator 1.3 : Average delay for processing criminal procedures
Indicator 1.4 : Number of civil procedures processed per judge
Indicator 1.5 : Number of criminal procedures processed per judge
Indicator 1.6 : Number of civil and criminal procedures processed per civil servant
Indicator 1.7 : Rate of cassation (in both civil and criminal procedures)
OBJECTIVE # 2 : Make the reponse, the enforcement and adaptation of sentences in Criminal Matters more effective
Indicator 2.1 : Rate of alternative responses (sentences management)
Indicator 2.2 : Average delay for the communication of the sentences to the national criminal record
Indicator 2.3 : Rate of judgments enforcement
Indicator 2.4 : Average delay for the judgments enforcement
OBJECTIVE # 3 : Modernize justice operations
Indicator 3.1 : Average cost per criminal case
Indicator 3.2 : Volume of electronic communication between the courts and the other partners

14. The agenda 14
1. The changes provided by the new law
2. Implementation
A new chain of responsibility
A simplified framework for performance
3. Limits and perspectives

15. 15
Performance as a support for budgetary decisions
Take into account the performance results for budgeting faces several limits :
- The budgetary envelope is capped under a global amount which depends on
exogenous factors
- The link between performance and budget is not direct : better results can be obtained
through an optimization of resources allocation and better practices
- The evaluation of results is not always connected with the level of resources employed :
a more global evaluation of public policies can be necessary
Public managers accountability faces several difficulties:
- Political and administrative rythms are different
- The transversal nature of public policies tends to make Program directors (RPROG) not
directly responsible
- Budgeting does not take into account performance (Supreme Audit Court)
How can performance results
be taken into account for budgeting?

16. 16
Develop the role of the management controllers
2 main activities :
■ Analyze the value chain of activities : improve our knowledge of costs, activities and results in
order to:
– Invest in the activities that create more value (effectiveness)
– Maximize the output of resources employed (efficiency)
■ Develop the management dialogue between the different levels of responsability (program
directors, operational budget officers, …) :
– Optimize resource allocation between units
– Challenge the use of resources and results achievement
– Share best practices
Assess the results and
the deviations with
the forecast

17. 17
The evaluation of public policies remains underused
■ A various number of institutions involved :
– Interministerial Inspection Units : IGAS, IGA, IGF
– Ministerial Inspection Units
– The Supreme Audit Institution
– Reports from the Parliament
– Other institutions : France Stratégie, CAE, INSEE, etc.,
■ The law for public finance provides the « expenses review » as a mandatory step for
cost-saving purposes and a necessary input for the budgetary annual process
– Thematical expenses audits will be brought to the Parliament at the same time than the
finance law project. They will be assessed by the Interministerial Inspection Units before
March of the following year
– The Budget Directorate will feed these audits and use their conclusions as an input for the
strategic preparation of the budget
But to turn evaluation into decision-making and implementation is a tough job !

18. The new finance organic law : 3 core goals 18
☺
Focus on
a multi-year
strategy
■ Make the strategic
choices in terms of
public finance more
clear
■ A strategic management
of public policies
Improve
transparency
■ Strengthen the role of
the Parliament for the
expenses
authorisation and
control procedures
■ Transparency and
honesty of the
budgetary information
Develop
efficiency
■ Reinforce the freedom of
action and the
responsability of public
officers
■ A results-oriented budget
process
■ Public managers action
driven by performance

19. Thanks for your attention !
Mail : veronique.fouque@finances.gouv.fr