Seòmar agus comataidhean

Thank you. Does anyone else want to come in?

What relationships and communication do you have when projects start to go wrong? I will use the ferries as an example.

Will you tell us more about how you monitor overall progress and what information is provided to you? Once you have given out the plan, what updates do you get?

Is it normal for a body to take out a governance review and then not share its findings with an auditor?

Good morning. Paragraph 10, on page 4 of the report, states:

“Following discussions with ... the Lanarkshire Board ... the SFC commissioned a review of governance at the start of July 2021.”

What prompted the Scottish Funding Council to undertake that review?

Paragraph 11, which is also on page 4 of the report, states:

“The SFC shared a redacted copy of the report with the principal and chair once it was finalised in August.”

As we heard, it was highly redacted. The paragraph then states:

“Other board members and the senior management team received a redacted copy of the report in October and December 2021 respectively.”

Paragraph 12 states:

“The redacted SFC report was formally considered by the board in December 2021.”

Do we know why it took them until December to formally consider the report?

In paragraph 12, the report states:

“the independent auditor notes in their annual audit report that they ‘have no assurance that the action plan covers all the recommendations made, due to the level of redactions in the [SFC] report.’”

Has the Scottish Funding Council reviewed the action plan? Is it happy that all the action points have been covered? Is it involved in making sure that the action points are actioned?

Good morning, everybody. In evidence to the committee, the Comptroller and Auditor General concluded that HMRC’s outturn figures and administration of the system were reasonable, and that the administration of Scottish income tax had

“now reached what is essentially the implementation of business as usual.”

He also said:

“HMRC’s focus must now be on refining its processes to maintain an accurate and complete record of the Scottish taxpayer population and on continuing to monitor the risk of non-compliance that might or might not arise as a result of divergence between UK and Scottish tax rates.”—[Official Report, Public Audit Committee, 3 February 2022; c 3.]

What areas of refinement are still required

“to maintain an accurate and complete record of the Scottish taxpayer population”?

Do the errors appear to be intentional or unintentional?

Thank you.