Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20-33)
NORTHERN IRELAND
AUDIT OFFICE
21 FEBRUARY 2005
Q20 Mr Davidson: Why do you not? What
would it be if you did have one?
Mr Dowdall: We have looked at
this carefully over the years and we have watched Sir John's achievements
with real admiration. We looked very carefully at the audit report
which was produced last year to try to see the lessons we could
learn from it. We have never been able to manage 8:1. We do try
to quantify our ratio and it has usually been between 2:1 and
3:1 and last year it was around 3:1. I am not too apologetic about
that because I think I am in much the same position as my other
regional equivalents, if you talk to the C&AG in Scotland
or perhaps to Sir John about what he can achieve in Wales. I talk
to my equivalent in the Republic of Ireland and none of us in
the regional context is able to achieve anything like those ratios.
Q21 Mr Davidson: Are you saying to me
then that there are enormously greater inefficiencies in the UK
system which Sir John is able to root out than you are able to
identify in Northern Ireland?
Mr Dowdall: Not at all.
Q22 Mr Davidson: What you seem to be
saying to me then is that Northern Ireland is such a taut drum
that there is nothing else.
Mr Dowdall: No, not at all. What
I am saying to you is that there are two reasons for it. It is
scope and scale. If you look at the scope of Sir John's audit
work, by studying that audit report we were able to see very clearly
some of the key differences, and compare his scope with mine.
Let me just give you a few indicators: I do not have the MoD;
I do not have any of the really big revenue departments like Inland
Revenue or Customs and Excise; I do not even have prisons and
police in Northern Ireland because they are audited by Sir John.
So the scope of my audits is much diminished compared with some
of the areas where he can achieve very large scale.
Q23 Mr Davidson: You could presumably
give us a like for like comparison then. If you are saying to
us that Sir John is able to get 20:1 or 16:1 in some areas and
therefore that balances out to give him an overall average, then
presumably you would be able to give us a note drawing to our
attention how you compare in the areas you have with what Sir
John achieves in those areas?
Mr Dowdall: I have not done that
like for like comparison.
Q24 Mr Davidson: That would be good if
we could have that then, because that would enable us to—
Mr Dowdall: Not quite, no, it
would not, because you have not taken my second point yet, which
is scale. There are enormous diseconomies of small scale in audit
and I am the smallest scale. You will appreciate that it would
not take 10 times the resources to audit a £100 billion account
as it would to audit a £10 million account, yet if you find
a saving, your savings are likely to be 10 times.
Q25 Mr Davidson: Honestly, you are a
much better performer than most of the Northern Ireland civil
servants we get in front of us. You are basically saying to us
that we live in the best of all possible worlds, that everything
is fine and that we should just give you more money and get on
with it. Is there no criticism that you would accept?
Mr Dowdall: That is a slight paraphrase
of what I said. What I tried to say was that Northern Ireland
is not quite as bad as the impression you might have got from
the five or six cases you have seen since we came back into direct
rule and I am happy to support that. You could look at some of
the other cases. On targeting savings, I am as keen as anybody
on targeting savings. I think we do relatively well for a small
office. I am determined that we will keep on a rising trend.
Q26 Mr Davidson: Who is your appropriate
benchmark? Scotland and Wales?
Mr Dowdall: As far as I am aware,
Scotland does not benchmark in this sense; I am not aware of them
having a target in this area. My equivalent in Dublin certainly
does not. I am not aware of one in Wales. To be honest with you,
I should be surprised if Sir John does not do it, though I would
have to check that.
Mr Davidson: Maybe we could have something
in order that we could have a degree of comparison, otherwise
we are just flying blind. I am never sure whether or not these
sorts of explanations are genuine explanations or simply alibis.
If we were doing some sort of comparison, that would be immensely
helpful for us.[1]
Q27 Mr Field: Earlier you said that you
only bring forward your worst cases for us to look at.
Mr Dowdall: Yes.
Q28 Mr Field: We are also interested
as a committee in trying to improve the entrepreneurship within
the public sector. Even though we might not spend a lot of time
on it, we should be quite interested in looking at the very best
cases, so we could say "Well done" to people as well
as catching them out.
Mr Dowdall: I am conscious of
that and I do try to reflect that in my programme. We are trying
to be constructive in relation to the government reform initiative.
We are placing ourselves as constructively as we can in relation
to the large burgeoning of PFI work in Northern Ireland to try
to help with it rather than just stand on the sidelines and criticise
it. I have a report coming out next week on modern construction
procurement methods, which is an attempt to look at best practice
and see how it has been applied in Northern Ireland. We could
certainly consider putting some of those into the future programme
and of course I should like to leaven the programme a little bit
so that Mr Davidson could see some of the other side of the work.
Q29 Mr Field: For the governance this
side of the Irish Sea the Treasury has set a figure of £20
billion for efficiency savings by 2007-08. Is there an equivalent
programme in Northern Ireland?
Mr Dowdall: Yes.
Q30 Mr Field: What part are you playing
in monitoring that this is real and on track?
Mr Dowdall: Because we are in
a period of direct rule at the moment and it is your own Westminster
ministers who are actually running the departments, of course
they did insist on full read-across of the efficiency programme
and what are called the Gershon savings, the 2.5%, 5%, 7.5% which
make up the figure you have just quoted, are fully read across
by Northern Ireland departments. They have been going through
a similar process of producing efficiency technical notes to explain
how those savings are going to be measured and achieved and we
have been doing essentially parallel work to Sir John's on those,
advising our equivalent of Treasury on those efficiency technical
notes to see whether they can be improved. I would expect, as
the initiative goes on, our involvement in Northern Ireland will
parallel Sir John's in Whitehall, that if he is asked to play
a further role and as he is asked to do so, in measuring or verifying
those savings, we will have to do the equivalent.
Q31 Mr Field: Will you be publishing
your findings on that work?
Mr Dowdall: That is for determination
in the future. It has not even been discussed with the Treasury
yet. The principle will be what is agreed in Whitehall; we will
follow the same in Northern Ireland.
Q32 Chairman: Why did your travel costs
increase by 98% in 2003?
Mr Dowdall: It sounds improbable,
Chairman. I have no idea.
Q33 Chairman: I am told that it is not
separately identified in the estimate, but the resource accounts
for 2003-04 indicate an increase of 98%, that is £52,000
to £103,000.
Mr Dowdall: You had better let
me have a look at that and either let you have a note or answer
you tomorrow. I am shocked. Too many trips over here I should
think is the trouble. [2]
Chairman: Thank you very much. Thank
you Mr Dowdall, thank you Mr Moore.
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