Chamber and committees

What criteria would determine whether whole-life costing is required? You talked about complexity and so on, but can you give us an example?

Using your example, it does not seem to be that complicated to work out the whole-life cost of a fire engine, because fuel consumption, maintenance and so on can be projected into the future using inflation factors and so on.

Is there enough information to enable somebody to put together a proposal?

I am not getting the impression that there is a process of proactively checking which suppliers are not getting work.

Is there any support for smaller suppliers on making best use of the framework once they are on it?

Do you know how many companies have not received any work?

The Auditor General’s briefing paper says that

“it is difficult to get a complete picture ... of how”

the Scottish Government

“is directing funding to”

its infrastructure

“priorities.”

That seems to be because there is limited supporting documentation on how projects are prioritised. I do not know whether “limited supporting documentation” is some kind of code for poor-quality record keeping, but there is no indication of how those projects contribute to wider policy outcomes, such as gender equality, climate change and so forth. Do you agree with that?

Do you agree with the Auditor General’s briefing?

Okay.

Another comment from the Auditor General was that it was

“difficult to track the progress and spending of individual”

IIP

“projects and programmes.”

Do you agree with that?