All responses seem to be woolly

Presumably, the reason for the continuing woolliness of answers in the House is that it is the same civil servants who write them. But one would hope that occasionally Ministers would look at them and point out that what is supposed to be a response is nothing of the kind, even to relatively non-contentious questions.

Lord Pearson put down a Written Question on what must be a relatively non-contentious issue though the lack of clear response makes one wonder what is being hidden:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the value for money of their funding of £1.5 million to the Sarsen Housing Association in Cornwall for 20 affordable homes.

The response was a little odd in that it stated the obvious without replying to the question:

Grant funding to Sarsen Housing Association to provide 20 affordable homes was provided through the Home and Communities Agency's (HCA) National Affordable Housing Programme.

Funding was made available through a competitive bidding basis where bids were assessed against four main criteria, value for money-in terms of total public subsidy per home and per person housed, design and quality standards, deliverability and local and regional priorities.

So what assessment has been made?