Total Expenditure on Services

What is the TES Framework?

Total Expenditure on Services (TES) broadly represents the total current and capital expenditure of the public sector. Alternatively put, TES is the spending required to deliver services, not just the purchasing of services.

This framework follows closely the National Accounts measure of Total Managed Expenditure (TME), and can be further split between:

Capital Expenditure- that is spending on the purchase of assets above a certain threshold which are expected to be used for a year or more, e.g. the purchase of buildings, equipment or land; this also includes the payment of capital grants
Current Expenditure- that is spending on items consumed in the process of providing a public service, e.g. wages & salaries as well as purchases of goods & services; this also includes the payment of current grants

In simplified terms TES can be derived by summing together:

Items in budgets classified as spending in National Accounts excluding (most) intra-public sector transfers (e.g. a central government department awarding a capital grant to a local authority)
Local government spending; and
Public corporation capital spending

A comparison of Budgets vs TES frameworks

In order to fully appreciate what the TES Framework does and does not cover, please see the comparison below:

Budget-based

Used to plan and control spending
Central Government (departments, agencies and Non-Departmental Public Bodies) and some Public Corporations
Includes intra-public sector transfers
Split into resource and capital budgets
Follows resource accounting

TES-based

Used for analytical purposes
Total public sector spending (Central Government, Local Government and Public Corporations)
Excludes intra-public sector transfers
Split into current and capital
Follows National Accounts

The TES Framework in PESA

The PESA Command Paper contains several chapters and tables showing analyses of public expenditure by function, region and economic category, based upon the TES framework.