§ Mr. ByersTo ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many files marked "not for National Audit Office eyes" are held by his Department.
Mr. John M. TaylorThere are 45 files in the Lord Chancellor's Department—out of a total of 90,974 files —marked "not for NAO eyes". These refer to individual file parts. For each NAO study a number of divisions may be involved and each may possess a file with a number of parts.
The marking "not for NAO eyes" is used in accordance with an agreement between the Treasury and the National Audit Office under which documents relating to the handling of relations between Departments and the NAO and Public Accounts Committee are not automatically available to the NAO while they are current.