In the last 25/30 years, civil servants have been given the same instructions as commerce: DON'T SPEND ANY MONEY ON ANYTHING. So they pass it on to the next department. Eventually, the bill has gone full circle and waits for a political (or CEO) to decided who pays.
In commerce, this regular problem stays private but govt is now supposed to be open and so the problems spill out.
Remember that no one is allowed to "use your common sense" anymore. We read this every day in postings in the SLF forum where agents can no longer 'do the right thing' by the customer. Very often, nor can the civil servants. I have not worked in central govt but have been in local and in (mainly) commerce for over 30 years.