National Audit Office: The preparedness of ministries to perform national defence tasks is insufficient, the Government Office must take the reins

4/25/2023 | 11:00 AM

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TALLINN, 25 April 2023 – The National Audit Office concluded that there are significant shortcomings in the preparedness to perform the national defence tasks in the majority of audited ministries. Although the Government Office should create a comprehensive and precise overview of the capabilities of various government bodies to perform national defence tasks, it has not been able to do so. The activities of the Government Office have also not been sufficient to eliminate common shortcomings in the government bodies. 

The National Audit Office audited the ability of the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Social Affairs, the Ministry of Rural Affairs and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications to perform 12 comprehensive national defence tasks, which support military defence, are related to internal security and the resilience of state authorities in a crisis. All ministries, except the Ministry of Defence, had significant shortcomings in preparedness to perform the national defence tasks.

Auditor General Janar Holm pointed out that the Government Office is the only one who has complete information about the plans of different parties due to the fact that it has the subplans of various ministries for a national defence crisis, and can effectively coordinate their preparations for crises. Although the Government Office gets an overview of the common shortcomings and recurring capability gaps of areas of government in the course of preparing the national defence action plan, it has not effectively led the search for solutions.

At the same time, there is also a lack of awareness among the government bodies and providers of vital services on how to prepare for national defence crises and how to act in a crisis. One reason for the lack of awareness is the classification of the plans ‑ those who must be prepared or who must prepare do not know what is expected of them. The Government Office and ministries must find a way to be able to transmit access-restricted information at the necessary level of generalisation to authorities that are to perform national defence tasks.

“In such a situation, the Government Office must be, figuratively speaking, like a music conductor,” said Janar Holm. “At the moment, however, every musician comes to the concert with their own music sheets, not knowing what others are playing. And then there are a lot of empty chairs in the orchestra waiting for musicians who do not know that they are supposed to sit there and play an instrument, because no one has told them to.”

The National Audit Office is drawing attention to the fact that authorities that carry out national defence tasks in practice do not receive sufficiently timely and relevant information. As a result, the authorities do not have a common understanding of how and which national defence crises they should prepare for and how to perform their tasks in a crisis. There are also lack of rules for sharing information in the event of a national defence crisis.

The National Audit Office emphasizes that ministries have common and similar shortcomings in preparedness that should be resolved uniformly. The activities of the Government Office as the coordinator of national defence have not sufficiently contributed to the elimination of shortcomings. The Government of the Republic also does not regularly have a comprehensive overview of which agreed tasks the ministries are capable of performing and which tasks have the largest capability gaps.

Capability gaps must be eliminated by ministries that have to find funds to cover national defence needs in addition to their normal tasks, either from their basic budget or through additional requests from the state budget. Over the years, additional funds have been requested from the state budget, but financing the elimination of gaps has so far been mostly on the background, insufficient and remained at the level of individual decisions.

The audit showed that the majority of government bodies do not have sufficient stocks to sustainably perform their tasks in a national defence crisis. Ministries rely too heavily on the stocks of the Estonian Stockpiling Agency, but they do not have information to which extent, from what moment and whether they could rely on the stocks of the Estonian Stockpiling Agency in the event of a crisis. The task of the Agency is not to create stocks for state authorities to perform national defence tasks, but the stocks are created for the purpose of security of supply of the population pursuant to the Emergency Act.

Although the National Defence Act imposes an obligation on the authorities to have stocks, this obligation has not been clarified. The legislation does not specify how large these stocks should be and how long the authorities should be able to manage with their stocks. Only in the area of government of the Ministry of Social Affairs there is a requirement established by a regulation of the minister for providers of vital services to ensure continuity of the vital services for 72 hours.

In the area of government of several ministries discussed, the total need for posts or employment with national defence work obligation , i.e. how many and for what purpose these positions are needed, was undefined.

There is still uncertainty in some authorities performing national defence tasks as to what tasks those holding a national defence work obligation can have and what are the obligations and restrictions that come with the respective status. Therefore, the audit was unable to assess whether the number of positions prescribed for and filled is sufficient to successfully perform national defence tasks.

The National Audit Office finds that the need for posts or employment with national defence work obligation must be analysed regularly. The number of posts and employment must correspond to the risk assessments and agreed scenarios. At the same time, the shortage of human reserves has emerged as a problem during crisis exercises.

Among those audited, the Ministry of Defence has managed to address the issues concerning human resources. The Ministry of the Interior who greatly relies on the substitution of the personnel during a crisis has also calculated the needs of human reserve.

Appointing and filling posts or employment with national defence work obligation is the only one way to ensure a sufficient number of people for authorities during a crisis, but if the created posts are not filled, we cannot be sure that the respective people will be ready to also perform their tasks during a crisis.

The National Audit Office recommends the State Secretary to take a greater role in introducing the common and recurring national defence capability gaps of the areas of government to the Government of the Republic. For example, these shortcomings should be discussed in the Government of the Republic when approving the national defence development plan. The Government Office should also pay more attention to connections with national defence when processing other sectoral development plans.

The National Audit Office recommends the State Secretary, in cooperation with ministries, to agree on common principles for the stockpiling of stocks for authorities. A common understanding should be reached in all areas of government as to for how long authorities should stockpile their usual stocks (e.g., food, water, fuel).

The National Audit Office recommends all ministers to analyse the need for posts or employment with national defence work obligation in the area of government and, based on this, appoint people for specific posts and employment. Due to the shortcomings in the areas of government of ministries, the National Audit Office also made several more specific recommendations to specific ministries on various topics.

Background

The purpose of the audit was to assess the preparedness of the state to act in the event of a national defence crisis and to determine whether different ministries have relevant plans and a sufficient number of people and material resources to perform the agreed tasks. The National Audit Office also assessed whether the coordination activities of the Government Office in preparing for a national defence crisis have provided a comprehensive overview of the ability of areas of government to perform national defence tasks and contributed to the elimination of more widely occurring shortcomings.

For the audit, the National Audit Office selected from about 90 national defence tasks 12 comprehensive national defence tasks of five ministries – the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Social Affairs, the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of Rural Affairs, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications – that support military national defence and are related to internal security and resilience. The National Audit Office analysed the preparedness of ministries to perform national defence tasks selected for the audit based on the national defence action plan approved in 2021. There is a public summary of the audit report. The report as a whole is for internal use.

Priit Simson

Head of Communications of the National Audit Office of Estonia

+372 640 0102
+372 5615 0280
[email protected]
[email protected]

http://www.riigikontroll.ee/

  • Posted: 4/25/2023 11:00 AM
  • Last Update: 4/25/2023 9:54 AM
  • Last Review: 4/25/2023 9:54 AM

The Government Office is the only one who has complete information about the plans of different parties.

Elmo Riig/Sakala/Scanpix

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