Audit Committee, 25 Nov 2003
Meeting date: Tuesday, November 25, 2003
Official Report
165KB pdf
Work Programme
Item 3 is the work programme. Members have a paper before them that explains where we are on a number of items in our work programme and outlines Audit Scotland's work programme. I invite the Auditor General for Scotland to comment on Audit Scotland's forward work programme.
The paper has been prepared by the clerk primarily to provide the opportunity for the committee to think about its forward work programme, but I welcome the opportunity to offer a comment or two on the substance of Audit Scotland's work programme.
Nothing in the schedule that accompanies the programme should be new to members of the committee, because it has been trailed in previous papers that have come to the committee on the forward work programme.
I will draw the committee's attention to the report on Scottish Enterprise. That is a significant item that I will bring to the Parliament before Christmas. Members might recall that in September I intimated to the committee that I intend to report on certain aspects of the work on Scottish Enterprise. My current intention is to secure the laying of that report in Parliament on Tuesday 9 December. It is not a full and comprehensive review of all aspects of the work of Scottish Enterprise; it concentrates on a number of significant areas that have been the subject of concern in the Parliament and in public.
The first of the areas examined is Scottish Enterprise's performance against its key targets and the systems that are used for monitoring its performance. Secondly, the report will cover the management of major projects. In relation to that, I will consider the issues of how budgets are distributed and how applications for European Union funding have been handled. I will also report on the Scottish Executive's use of consultants and contractors. A final issue that I will mention in the report and about which there is some concern relates to the number of staff employed in customer relations.
I remind the committee that, as the schedule to the paper shows, there are two further significant examinations under way at the moment. We have already started work on an examination of the business services area of Scottish Enterprise, which accounts for about a third of its budget. That report is due to be published in spring next year.
Some time ago, we published a report on the work of local economic forums and we will produce a follow-up report on the performance of those forums in the spring of next year.
I wanted to alert you to the significant report that will be published in early December. We are happy to answer any questions.
If there are no comments from members with regard to the forward work programme, it might be worth reiterating the fact that it looks as if, in January 2004, we will be considering our Scottish Further Education Funding Council draft report and that, at a later date, possibly February or March, we will undertake scrutiny of the financial consequences of legislation. Further, we do not know where we will be in relation to our individual learning accounts report—whether we can put it to bed before January depends on discussions that we will have later today.
With regard to the publication of the Scottish Enterprise report, there is an issue of timing that members should be aware of, which is that the Auditor General will, in effect, lay it before Parliament at our meeting on 9 December. My suggestion—based on precedent—is that we avail ourselves of that report, as representatives of Parliament, half an hour before the meeting opens so that we can read it in detail and can ask informed questions when it is gone through in public. Obviously, it is difficult to say now what the exact time for that will be, but I hope that members agree that we should meet informally half an hour before the meeting begins. Are we all agreed?
Members indicated agreement.
Thank you for your agreement, which will allow us to programme the meeting so that we can have the information before us. I wanted to flag up in public that we will meet informally.