Vol. 163 No. 5
I move:—
That a sum not exceeding £23,690 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1958, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General (No. 1 of 1923).
I want to query whether it is wise for the Comptroller and Auditor-General to go into the wide sphere of commercial auditing as he does?
Hear, hear!
The job of auditor is not merely one of checking tots and making sure that there have not been misappropriations, though even in that respect I want to express a doubt. The job of an auditor is to advise the commercial firm concerned and I do not think the function of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, in relation to ordinary Civil Service auditing, is one that means his office and his staff are constructed and equipped for the purpose of dealing with a commercial audit which is an entirely different thing.
The Comptroller and Auditor-General, in his capacity as auditor for the ordinary Civil Service Supply and Central Fund expenditure, is merely making sure that expenditure has been issued within the ambit of the various Votes, and making certain that the provisions which have been granted by this House in particular, and by the Oireachtas in Appropriations and Central Fund Bills, have not been exceeded. It is not part of his function to make any effort to suggest new methods, to make any effort to suggest more efficient methods, or to alter any form of the accounting. A commercial auditor, however, is expected by the firm or company which retains his services not merely to make sure the tots are correct but to do a great deal more. A commercial auditing firm is in a position, for example, to make checks in relation to possible misappropriations and defalcations on a commercial venture which the Comptroller and Auditor-General is not in a position to make. A good commercial auditor has experience of these matters and he is able to put his finger, in relation to various types of business, on the place where it is desirable for him to make absolutely certain that his clients have not been misled.
A good commercial auditor is also bound to give, and does give, to his clients, considerable advice on the form of the presentation of their accounts, on their accounting system, and will also assist his clients in pointing out to them what lines of business appear cursorily, from the examination of their audit, not to be working as they should. I do not think the Comptroller and Auditor-General is in any way qualified to do that in his office. In saying that, I want to make it perfectly clear that I am not casting any aspersions whatever on the personnel of that office—on the contrary — but the job they have been brought up to do, the job of auditing Supply and Central Fund expenditure, is in itself entirely different from the job of dealing with the commercial audit of semi-State companies.
So far as I can recollect, there are some 20 of these outside bodies, some partly inside, some partly outside, for which the Comptroller and Auditor-General acts as the commercial auditor. They are Irish Shipping, Limited, Fuel Importers, Limited, Mianraí Teoranta, Ceimicí Teoranta, Bord Fáilte, the Central Bank, the Irish Assurance Company, Shannon Airport catering service, the Army canteens, Aer Lingus, Aer Linte, Aer Rianta, Bord na Móna, the National Stud, Irish Steel Holdings, Tea Importers, Grain Importers, Córas Tráchtála Teoranta, the Arts Council and Foras Tionscail. I am sure that list is not exhaustive, but it is a list in respect of some of which I have no doubt whatsoever that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has his audit machinery quite competently organised but in respect of others of which I do not think he has.
I believe that part of the reason is that it was thought it would save some part of the costs from an Exchequer point of view having the Comptroller and Auditor-General do it. If that is to be the situation, there should be a separate commercial section of his Department to deal with semi-State organisations. It should not be, as it is at present, merely merged and amalgamated with the ordinary Supply and Central Fund expenditure audit. I want to deal with certain other modernisations which I think are necessary in our accounting system but I think it would be more proper to deal with it on Vote 6.
Ministers for Finance in the past insisted on having the work done by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Minister for Finance at the time felt he would get more uniform information from the various bodies and that his interests would be better looked after by having the Comptroller and Auditor-General audit the accounts. I do not know exactly what the considerations were. I would have to look into the matter and see. There are about 20 bodies—I think Deputy Sweetman named practically all of them—whose accounts are audited by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. They are all bodies in which the Minister for Finance has a financial interest and for that reason the Comptroller and Auditor-General did the audit. There may be something in what the Deputy says, that a commercial auditor with more experience of business might be better in certain respects but I am afraid this matter will have to be considered more fully.
Might I make a suggestion? Vote 6 is in respect of the Minister's own office. It is the general Vote. Would it not be better to deal, first, with all the individual items and then deal with Vote 6 at the end? We could then have a general discussion on Vote 6.
We can hold Vote 6 until the end.
