MR. GIBSON BOWLESI beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he is aware that the Civil Service Appropriation Accounts for the year ending 31st March only reach the Comptroller and Auditor General on the next 30th November, and that the Army and Navy Appropriation Accounts for the same period only reach him by 31st December; and whether these intervals of eight months and nine months respectively can be shortened and the accounts delivered earlier, so as to admit of a. more complete examination of them by the Comptroller and Auditor General before he presents his Reports thereon to the House.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURI understand that the dates 30th November and 31st December are fixed by the Exchequer and Audit Departments Act of 1866. The Comptroller and Auditor General is not limited in the examination of the accounts to the time after he has received them in a complete form. The accounts of the spending Departments are rendered monthly, and so his examination of them proceeds throughout the financial year, while in the largest Department he has his own officers permanently located for the work. I understand the Comptroller and Auditor General himself has no complaint to make of the time allowed.
MR. GIBSON BOWLESI would like to point out to the right hon. Gentleman that the dates are fixed in the Act only as the limit beyond which the time shall not be extended.