Chamber and committees

In general, but also with particular reference to this arrangement, is there enough transparency and openness about the financial arrangements that have been entered into? I presume that that is also part of your inquiry into what is going on at Port Glasgow.

We will continue on the theme of workforce issues.

I want to finish the session with a few short questions. You have catalogued the challenges that the organisation has faced as a result of staff training issues and staff vacancy issues. Arguably, there continue to be significant workload burdens on the staff. There are also issues with funding, and approaches have been made to the corporate body to increase funding. At the same time, the audit report recommends that important pieces of work be carried out, which I presume would be quite substantive, such as the drafting of a full investigations manual. There is also a proposal to bring in an external investigator in order to address some of the deficiencies in the organisation.

In the light of all that, do you think that that will be achievable?

Earlier, Colin Beattie asked you about where the negotiations between the commissioner’s office and the corporate body on the release of more resources lie. I think that you said that that was still the subject of negotiation. Is that correct?

As always, Auditor General, thank you very much for the frankness of your replies. I also take this opportunity to thank Richard Robinson as well as Pat Kenny of Deloitte, who have joined us online this morning.

That ends the public part of the meeting, and we now move into private session.

So is it that there was a policy, but it was not fit for purpose, or is it that there was a policy, but people were not sufficiently aware of it?

We will end where we started, with the comment in the Auditor General’s opening statement that this is all about public trust in the complaints system and how complaints are dealt with. What stands out in the report are recurring phrases such as “substantial weaknesses” and the need for “significant improvements”, and in paragraph 26, the report concludes:

“The overarching risk is a loss of public trust in the ability of the Commissioner’s Office to properly investigate and consider complaints made against the conduct of individuals in public life in Scotland.”

What is your assessment of where things stand today? Is there an existing crisis of confidence in the system?

I do not want to put words in your mouth, but are you saying that the risk and uncertainty is being fuelled by the collapse of Greensill Capital, which was the primary funder of GFG Alliance? GFG Alliance itself is the subject of a Serious Fraud Office investigation, because issues have been raised about its governance structure, which one UK minister described as “opaque”. Concerns have been expressed about changes to the accounting periods that the company is using. Auditors have resigned and finance directors have left. Is all that fuelling the assessment of heightened risk to which the Scottish Government is now exposed?

Colin Beattie has a series of questions.

Colin Beattie has a series of questions on governance.