The GSD has issued a reply to the Government’s recent statement regarding the new Principal Auditor.

A statement from the GSD follows below:

The Government has made it clear in its latest press release on the appointment of the new Principal Auditor  that they expect him to tread carefully around what they call ‘policy’ and thus are already trying to cage and muzzle him.  

Roy Clinton MP the GSD Shadow Minster for Public Finance stated the following:  

“We have already stated that the role of the Principal Auditor is a vital one in assisting Parliament in  scrutinising public finances and holding Government to account. It is extremely dangerous for the Government  to suggest that the work the Principal Auditor undertakes could be tainted politically or that he cannot comment  on areas the Government deems ‘policy’.  

This Government got a big fat ‘F’ grade in the last audit report for the year 2018 and still has not learnt that it  continues to fail on transparency and accountability, in short on good governance. If both the Principal Auditor  and the GSD have called for the creation of a Public Accounts Committee it is not a political conspiracy, but  rather good governance, in that it would be a powerful tool in Parliament’s scrutiny of expenditure and the  elimination of waste.  

The Government’s claim to have demonstrated a ‘commitment to transparency and accountability’ is not just  laughable but patently untrue as the Hansard of Parliament proves. The Government refuses to give financial  information hiding behind corporate structures; the corporate accounts that have been made public are mostly  unaudited abbreviated balance sheets and give no useful information to the reader.  

The Government accepts that it is the role of the Principal Auditor to hold it ‘to account’. So too is the role of  HM Opposition to hold Government to account, using the reports made available to Parliament by the Principal  Auditor, who after all is a Parliamentary Officer. To suggest that the Principal Auditor could be somehow  bullied by Opposition statements is to perhaps betray the Government’s intentions to do just that.  

The Principal Auditor has six years outstanding audits to deliver, and as the public now see everything from  rent to electricity increasing in advance of the Budget, they have a right to know how effectively and efficiently  this Government has spent their money in the past. ’