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Is there a potential issue for local autonomy in much the same way that we discussed earlier in relation to the national care service? Does the process pose any threat to local decision making and accountability?

I was pleased to hear the earlier discussion about the nature of audit work, which is about identifying not just failure but success. Over the years, I have sometimes felt that people are scared to come to this committee.

That is great.

There has been a substantial change to how we operate in the Parliament and there is plenty of evidence for that. Will you look at how we have done the work that we have done?

That is interesting. If public sector bodies continue to embrace the digital solutions that have been put in place during Covid, will you look at whether there is an impact on exclusion and so on? That is perhaps not a typical audit perspective, but will it be a key feature of your work to look at whether people are more excluded than they were before digital technology was embraced to the degree that it has been during Covid?

I turn to the exciting topic of the Government’s consolidated accounts. Recommendations from our predecessor committee touched on how we invest in support for private companies and on providing whole-sector public accounts. Those themes cropped up from time to time in our discussions. Has the Government made any progress in addressing those issues? How should that work be taken forward?

Stephen Boyle mentioned at the end of his opening statement that digital transformation is one of his key themes. During the pandemic, digital technology probably saved a lot of jobs and businesses. Many businesses adapted quickly to using technology. The capabilities of the technology were always there, but we perhaps did not embrace them or use them in those particular ways. From an audit perspective, what will your approach be to looking at those issues, and what do you hope to get out of that?

It should not be like that. It is about identifying opportunities for improvement, which is very much my agenda with audit, so I am pleased that we have been able to shine a light on good performance in the public sector. I hope that other parts of the public sector will embrace that. I am really looking forward to this parliamentary session in that regard.

I want to nip back briefly to Craig Hoy’s question on following the pandemic pound. Auditor General, as part of that work, will you look at the systems that have been deployed and used to distribute funds to the public sector, businesses, communities and individuals? In my experience locally over the past 17 or 18 months, businesses, communities and those in the public sector have been very frustrated when trying to gain access to some of the Covid funds and schemes that have been in place. Will you look to see whether we got those systems right? I hope that we will not be adopting such schemes in the near future, but it is important that we look to see whether we got the processes correct.

Thank you.

On monitoring performance, you said that one of audit’s key functions is to close the loop and ensure that your recommendations are implemented and that we and the public can see the benefits. Do you envisage doing that through reports to us, or do you envisage the public being able to dip in and see for themselves the performance of the public bodies that you have looked at and perhaps to ask questions about and monitor things? Is that sort of thing just down to you and us?