1. The Committee on Standards
in Public Life ("the Nolan Committee") produced five reports covering
central government, local public spending bodies, local government, a review
of progress on the subjects of the first three reports, and funding political
parties. Key points from the reports on accountability and audit matters
are:
- the principles that should underpin public
life are selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness,
honesty and leadership;
- public money should be able to be tracked
wherever it goes;
- the propriety of all public expenditure
should be capable of review by the appropriate public auditing body;
- true accountability for many local public
spending bodies is to the Government and Parliament;
- internal systems for maintaining standards
should be supported by independent scrutiny;
- new service providers and purchasers should
be subject to good auditing using the best principles of public sector
audit including performance audit;
- the Auditor General should be granted
inspection rights over all public expenditure;
- as far as possible a single auditor should
be responsible for all aspects of public audit;
- regulators and funders should place reliance
on audit reports in place of their own detailed monitoring; and
- confidentiality clauses in service and
severance contracts are undesirable, and staff should be able to raise
legitimate concerns with authorities such as the National Audit Office.
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