UK GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTS QUALIFIED BY AUDIT OFFICE

UK GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTS QUALIFIED BY AUDIT OFFICE

SNP Treasury spokesperson Stewart Hosie MP has seized on reports that five UK government departments, including the Treasury and Ministry of Defence, have had their accounts for 2008/9 qualified by the National Audit Office (NAO). The others are HM Revenue and Customs, the Department for Work and Pensions and the Home Office. The information was “sneaked out” in a series of written ministerial statements. Mr Hosie: “When the Treasury and the taxman cannot balance their own books it goes beyond the normal cut and thrust of political debate and becomes a question of basic competence. “It is also outrageous that this information is being sneaked out by Ministers in the hope that nobody will notice. “It is staggering that these key spending departments can get their accounting so wrong that their books have been qualified. It is the clearest indication of a complete loss of control in these departments, and another example of the collapse in the ability of Labour to govern.”