§ 38. Mr. David HeathWhat proportion of National Audit Office resources is directed to the auditing of those non-departmental public bodies not statutorily required to be audited by the National Audit Office. [20233]
§ Mr. SheldonWork on cases in which statutes provide discretion on the appointment of auditors and the relevant Secretary of State appoints the National Audit Office accounted for less than 2 per cent. of the resources spent by the NAO on financial audit in 1996–97 and for 1 per cent. of overall resources. In cases in which the Comptroller and Auditor General is not responsible for the audit, the relevant Secretary of State appoints the auditors and sets the terms of the audit, which makes the bodies more accountable to the Executive than to Parliament. The Public Accounts Committee has 18 repeatedly urged that the Comptroller and Auditor General should become the appointed auditor of all non-departmental public bodies.
§ Mr. HeathI am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that reply. Does he agree that there is a need to extend the scope of the National Audit Office and the Audit Commission—and the equivalent bodies in Scotland and Northern Ireland—to ensure that no quango can spend public money, whether from Government, the European Union, or, as the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) said, from lotteries, without it being properly audited and the audit being made available to the House?
§ Mr. SheldonI fully agree with the hon. Gentleman. One of the shameful aspects is that the European Court of Auditors has access to some areas to which our own Comptroller and Auditor General does not have access. That needs to be looked at urgently.