§ Mr. John Fraserasked the Secretary of State for the Environment what arrangements exist for the monitoring and auditing of the application of inner city partnership funds.
§ Sir George YoungUrban programme expenditure is local authority expenditure supported by central Government grant. Responsibility for monitoring and auditing lies in the first place with the local authority concerned. Grant claims made by the local authority must be checked within my Department and are then certified by the local authority's independent auditor. My Department in turn has its own internal audit procedures and is subject to scrutiny by the National Audit Office.
In addition, my officials regularly analyse inner area programmes to compare outturn with approved expenditure. At project level, as well as monitoring visits to a sample of projects the Department commissions studies of the effectiveness of projects in particular fields.