Good morning, Auditor General. We will discuss both colleges together, rather than separately. I think that there are aspects of the reports that pose more questions than they answer. For example, “The 2016/17 audit of New College Lanarkshire” says under “The auditor’s opinion” that the audit
“has highlighted concerns about the college’s financial sustainability.”
However, we do not get the reasons behind that or what needs to be done to address it.
Later on, in paragraph 9 the report says that
“there were unexpected costs associated with Coatbridge College.”
What were they, when did they occur, why did they occur and why did nobody do anything about them timeously?
In paragraph 11, in relation to national bargaining, the report says that the college
“did not include any cost in its budget and the final additional cost was £400,000.”
Why was no provision made?
In paragraph 12, there is a very serious statement about not paying people on time in order to improve the college’s cash flow, which is totally contradictory to Government policy right across the board. Paragraph 13 mentions “financial reporting concerns”. What were they?
Those examples are from the report. There are other concerns that I know of about New College Lanarkshire to do with staffing and the relationship between it and the number of people at senior level. The same is true of Edinburgh College: there is concern about the number of highly paid people at senior level, when people who are delivering lectures are being made redundant. There are loads of concerns there, but the reports do not bring any of that out.