HBMC: Financial Management (Hansard, 26 February 1986)

§ Baroness Birk
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.

§ The Minister of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Elton)
My Lords, I am satisfied that an effective framework exists within which the commission manages public funds and that these procedures will, and apparently have, detected some early signs of weakness in financial control. I am of course concerned about such weaknesses. The commission have been asked for a full report or their financial procedures. An interim report by the commission's chief executive to the Permanent Secretary of my department will, I understand, arrive later today. They will discuss what further action needs to be taken.

§ Baroness Birk
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply which indicates that some action is being taken. But has he seen the very disturbing reports in a national newspaper this week indicating that financial control in the commission is very weak indeed, and that this has led to inadequate control both of budget and of expenditure on what would appear, unfortunately, to be a very serious scale? Since the commission were set up because it was felt that if they were hived off from the DoE they would be able to preserve the heritage far better and would also give better value to the public for its money, this is surely a matter for great concern. Not only the public but—and perhaps in this case, even more important—the heritage will suffer unless there is very tight and strict control. The matter is, I submit, one of great urgency.

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, at the time when the commission were set up to take this function out of central government there was great anxiety that they should be given flexibility and the noble Baroness made useful contributions in the debates on the National Heritage Bill to that effect. Nonetheless, when they were set up they inherited the same delegation of authority to incur expenditure as previously applied to this function within the department. The only modification of those control mechanisms was those minimum changes necessary to adapt them to a non-departmental public body. What I would emphasise to your Lordships is that we believe that this machinery has in fact exposed a weakness of proceedings about which I would not wish to comment until I have read the report which is being submitted.

§ Lord Mellish
My Lords, is the Minister aware that when historical buildings and monuments were under the control of the Ministry of Public Building and Works in the old days it did a first-class job, nobody ever questioned what happened and the moneys were well and truly spent? We now have an outside commission, whoever they are, and all we read about is bungle and a complete mess-up. Would it not be better to hand them back to where they came from, to the Government, who did the job so much better?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, the noble Lord has somewhat telescoped what would have been an interesting argument. I do not accept the conclusions of his argument, but not having heard it it is difficult to analyse at what point I would depart from his view. But I can tell the noble Lord that although I think the commission are doing a good job and they are getting more people involved in conservation and in the enjoyment of the monuments in their care, the Question relates to financial control. I repeat that the mechanisms set up are similar to those for central government. They have alerted us to what may be a weakness and that is being reported on.

§ Baroness Airey of Abingdon
My Lords, may I ask my noble friend the Minister whether he is aware that I am speaking as a trustee of the National Heritage Memorial Fund and that we work very closely with the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission, who have been very helpful in expert advice and constru- 1048 tion? We have also worked with them jointly in projects such as the Brighton West Pier and Caulke Abbey. We feel that they are a very estimable commission and they have been very helpful to us.

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that helpful intervention. The commission are a relatively new body. In less than two years they have attracted 40,000 members and secured the first £95,000 in business sponsorship. I think your Lordships should have a little more confidence in them than the tone of general questions has given rise to.

§ Baroness Birk
My Lords, is the Minister aware that it is not with any pleasure that I raise this Question? It is with great concern. Is it not the case that, however good the commission are in many of their activities, with which I heartily agree, the basic point about an independent body, or quango, is that its financial control must be very strict and it must even bend over backwards. I would differ from the Minister in comparing their position now with when they were in the department, where, as he knows very well, the controls are very strict indeed.

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, the noble Baroness is perhaps not aware that the chief officer of the commission is an accounting officer, responsible on the same lines of answerability to the Houses of Parliament as is the Permanent Secretary of the Department of the Environment. So the controls are the same as those which existed before the commission were made independent; at the time, for instance, in 1976 when there was an inquiry into business at Audley End, which she will recall because she was standing at the Dispatch Box with my responsibilities at the time.

§ Lord Harmar-Nicholls
My Lords, is my noble friend aware that common sense would seem to dictate that it would be better to wait for the report which he said is on its way rather than try to examine it in this piecemeal fashion?

§ Lord Elton
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for reminding me that common sense is something which it is essential to preserve on occasions at Question Time.