You mentioned regional variations. Appendix 3 of the Audit Scotland report shows quite marked variations in some of those measures. For example, on referrals for suspected cancer within the 62-day treatment guarantee, the figures for the two health boards in the area that I represent are 83 per cent for NHS Forth Valley and 89 per cent for NHS Lanarkshire against a target of 95 per cent. For NHS Shetland, the figure is 50 per cent against that target, and both NHS Tayside and NHS Grampian are at just 60 per cent. What analysis have you done to understand why there is such a variance between different health boards and health board areas?

To give a fuller picture, if I look at the A and E stats, NHS Forth Valley and NHS Lanarkshire perform very poorly, do they not? The statutory target is for 95 per cent of people to receive treatment within four hours, but Lanarkshire’s performance is 55 per cent and Forth Valley’s is 54 per cent.

I will ask you a question that was posed to the Auditor General when he was here. Is there any correlation between poor performance in A and E and better performance in some of those other indicators?

We are going to touch on some of those performance measures as the morning progresses. Before I take us to another area, I place on record my membership of two trade unions that organise in the national health service.

I turn to staff sickness absence rates, which is recorded in this annual performance report on the NHS in Scotland as being at a 10-year high. What is your assessment of that issue, what are you doing to address it, and how are you going to turn it around?

Thank you very much, convener. I have no relevant interests to declare.

The committee welcomes that advance. Whether it meets the standard of transparency that we are looking for will depend on how much is redacted and how much you are able to share with us. We will see the outcomes in the course of the next few weeks, and I am sure that we will have further conversations with you about that.

I take you back to my initial question. I had an exchange with the First Minister about the transparency review at the Conveners Group in September, in which part of his response was, “Yes, we’re learning lessons from the Covid inquiry and so on.” Some of our concerns in this area stem from the ferries contracts—not only how those contracts were awarded, but the extent to which we were able to get to the bottom of how they were awarded and who was involved. The committee had concerns about whether proper recording of ministerial meetings took place. There were questions about whether special advisers constituted civil servants and where decisions were made. For example, the decisions to award the contract to Ferguson Marine Engineering Ltd and those on the two loans worth £45 million did not go to the Cabinet.

We thought that the transparency review would go much broader than the strategic commercial assets division. That is also what I took from what the First Minister said in the exchange that I had with him. Could you clarify that?

Thank you for clearing that up; it is helpful to get that on the record.

The committee identified a particular concern. During the course of the ferries inquiry, we uncovered the fact that Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd had been directed by the minister or ministers to award the contract to Ferguson Marine Engineering Ltd—as it was at the time—but that there is no public record of that. Therefore, one of the recommendations that this committee made was that, in instances in which there is a shareholder authorisation—that is, where the Government is the sole shareholder and overrides the board of a non-departmental public body—that should be a matter of record, just as a written authority is a matter of record. Mr Irwin has recently issued a second written authority on the construction of vessel 802—the Glen Rosa.

We think that there is an equivalence there. If the fact that a minister has overridden the judgment of a civil servant ought to be a matter of public record, the fact that a minister has overridden a judgement by the board of a non-departmental public body should also be recorded, in line with the rules that are set out in the Scottish public finance manual.

That is a very helpful answer.

The deputy convener has some other questions to put to you.

You sat here exactly 12 months ago and said the same thing. Mr Irwin said:

“the appointment of auditors in the UK is a priority for it.” —[Official Report, Public Audit Committee, 18 January 2024; c 39.]

If that is a “priority”, I would hate to see something that was not. There is a real issue here, is there not? In this year’s Scottish consolidated accounts section 22 report, £130 million is the estimate of the exposure of public money. There is public interest in the matter. Why is there not more transparency? Why is more pressure not being brought to bear by the Scottish Government?

The select committee of the House of Commons concluded a couple of years ago that Mr Gupta, who is the sole director,

“fails to fulfil the criteria that we believe should be applied to define a fit and proper person for the purposes of receiving any form of Government support.”

Why do you take a different opinion?

I will move things along and invite Graham Simpson to put some questions to you.

Okay, but the Auditor General told us on 7 November that it

“remains a matter of concern”.—[Official Report, Public Audit Committee, 7 November 2024; c 21.]

Again, that is probably putting it mildly.

We are nearly at the end of our time, but the deputy convener has one final question to put to you.