National Audit Office and Public Accounts Committee

HC Deb 06 December 1993 vol 234 cc7-8W

Mr. Alan Williams

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many files marked "Not for National Audit Office eyes" are held by the Department; and how many are marked "Not for Public Accounts Committee eyes".

Mr. Howard

There is no marking "Not for PAC eyes".

No central record of files marked "Not for NAO eyes" is maintained. The information could be obtained only by examining individually each of the 1.5 million extant files in my Department, and could therefore only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

The marking "Not for NAO eyes" is used rarely and 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 PAC are not automatically available to the NAO while they are current.