Long-awaited Single Departmental Plans, setting out in detail how Whitehall departments expect to implement the settlements of last year's Spending Review, are expected to be published "very shortly", CSW has been told.
Publication of the plans, which have been described by civil service chief executive John Manzoni as offering a "single, clear roadmap" for the next four years of change in Whitehall, could come as early as 2pm today, according to sources.
They mark an attempt by government to sharpen long-term planning, and are expected to tie up specific manifesto commitments with wider plans for organisational reform in the context of the fresh round of spending cuts facing many departments in the wake of November's government-wide Spending Review.
Publication of the plans has slipped since they were first announced last summer. The Spending Review document said they would be published "in December 2015", while Manzoni told MPs late last year that they would be published in January.
CSW understands that the delays reflect some debate in Whitehall over the level of detail that the public documents should go in to, without undermining their use as an internal planning tool.