Seòmar agus comataidhean

Sorry—I have a further question on gallery production and the facility in Aberdeen, which is to become what is called, I think, a reserve facility. Half a million pounds was spent on that. Are you honestly saying that it is a reasonable to have that as a reserve facility, and that you will ship people up to Aberdeen at short notice if there is a problem in Glasgow? Is that a sham to cover for the fact that you should not have invested that money if you were not going to use that facility?

I have only a couple of questions. Looking at the data that you provided for the validation that you might get from media reach—I think that that might be the way to describe it—do you see dangers in that? Some people say that there is a formulaic approach whereby reports are produced that are relatively straightforward and discuss the pros and cons of an issue, but contain a soundbite quote at the end that, if you publish it on the right day, is guaranteed to stir up a good amount of parliamentary discussion and media coverage. Is there a danger that you might be seen to be chasing headlines and adding to a preponderance of negative stories, given that the media will always prefer those to positive ones? Do you recognise that danger if you are looking to that metric for validation?

Another one for which I was responsible—thank you for that.

From a layperson’s point of view, though, an unqualified opinion would give a level of reassurance that would be completely unjustified in this instance. They failed to set a budget; they failed to show why they had not set a budget; they were not able to provide evidence of any discussion as to why they had not set a budget, which is a breach of the financial regulations; and they were also making substantial errors in what they were doing. An unqualified opinion is surprising to me, as a layperson.

Deloitte was the auditor for the college.

It was then appointed as the external auditor—or am I getting that wrong?

I was not so much saying whether it was a good or a bad thing but, looking at my own area, we have Forth Valley College, and there is this potential dog-eat-dog approach where people are chasing student numbers because that is the basis of much of the income of both further and higher education institutions. Within a board area that has three different campuses, even if the two larger campuses decide that they want to be the ones to get the lion’s share of the numbers, it strikes me as odd that there seems to be substantial unmet demand. For example, lots of students want to go to the Forth Valley College Alloa campus in Clackmannanshire, yet it cannot afford to fulfil those places because of the grant that it gets. It seems to me that there is more of a general dog-eat-dog approach between the different institutions. I have not finished reading your previous report so I do not know whether you have covered that, but it would have important implications and lessons around the direction for the sector more generally if that was the case. Are we looking at fewer students? What is the effect of the income that has been lost from overseas students in particular, and how do we get a more equitable distribution?

I remember that, 20-odd years ago, Audit Scotland did a best-value report on local authorities, in which the council of which I was leader—Clackmannanshire Council—came top. We never heard any comment on that apart from the comments of Clackmannanshire Council and myself, who shouted about it for years afterwards. However, that kind of positive evidence is important, not just for its own sake or because it might make people feel good, but because it demonstrates what is being done right and can be used as an example to help others to improve.

Sometimes there is a lack of context. When an area of public life in Scotland is being looked at, comparisons with what is happening in similar areas in England and Wales—whether things are better or worse—are meaningful to people because there is a relatively similar financial environment in all three areas and people can see whether, for example, Brexit is impacting on an area. However, instead of that, we get told that, for example, there is underfunding, which is a loaded term that relies on a value judgment. Surely, there must be a case for saying that there are times when, if something has been done well, we should broadcast that. Similarly, if something has been done badly—especially in relation to other parts of the UK where it has been done better, given the similar environment—that would be meaningful information for the public.

I come back to the public because, by talking about your social media reach and your public relations, you are recognising that the public are interested in these issues, which might be expressed through the Parliament. However, by and large, beyond the headlines that are generated, how much does your work register with the public? I hope that you can make sense of that question.

I am delighted to hear what you say about SNIB, having had Cabinet responsibility for establishing it. Off the top of your head, could you mention one or two other examples where one of your reports on an area in which you have found good practice or excellent work has generated any kind of media response?

That last point is of interest to me. I am aware of some organisations—one in particular—that customarily receive lots of small donations of £10 or £15 but are not able to show receipts for those or individual accounts, and, for that reason, their accounts have been qualified. Here we have an organisation that failed to set a budget—which, as you have just said, is a breach of the financial regulations—yet got a clean bill of health from the auditor. How does that work?

I agree that independence is a good thing.

I was not aware of the extent to which deficit budgets are used in the further education sector or the frequency with which they are used. I realise that I am asking you to make a bit of a subjective judgment here, but is there a possibility that a culture might start to develop such that people are thinking to themselves, “Well, there is always the option of a deficit budget”? Could that have been part of the reason why, in this case, they got a bit more lax about even setting a budget at all?