Various attempts have been made in the public sector to achieve a more stable, long-term planning base in contrast to the traditional short-term annual budgeting approach, with its emphasis on ‘flexibility’.

You are required to:

(a) explain the deficiencies of the traditional approach to planning which led to the attempts to introduce PPBS (programme budgeting);

(b) give an illustration of how a PPBS plan could be drawn up in respect of one sector of public authority activity;

(c) discuss the problems which have made it difficult in practice to introduce PPBS.