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The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
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Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
I am not trying to trip anybody up, but are you saying that you do not think that the Scottish Fiscal Commission uses that estimate, but you use it as a reference point?
Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
Okay. We might return to that before we finish.
My next question is for Jonathan Athow. The Audit Scotland report that accompanies the NAO report made a point about good governance and assurance arrangements and the need to keep those under continual review. It said that the process should include
“ongoing consideration of the frequency of third-party data checks and Service Level Agreement performance measures, such as setting compliance target levels for Scottish taxpayers without ‘S’ prefixes.”
Why has HMRC still not introduced a target in relation to the number of missing S prefixes? Will it do so at some point in the future?
Public Audit Committee
Section 22 Report: “The 2020/21 audit of South Lanarkshire College”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
I welcome Graham Simpson, who is an MSP for Central Scotland and who joins us for item 2, which is consideration of the 2020-21 audit of South Lanarkshire College.
I am pleased to welcome the Auditor General for Scotland, Stephen Boyle, to give evidence to the committee. We are also joined by Rebecca Seidel, who is a performance audit and best value manager at Audit Scotland, and by Lucy Nutley, who is a director at Mazars and who I think carried out the audit on the ground at the college.
I invite the Auditor General to give us a short opening statement.
Public Audit Committee
Section 22 Report: “The 2020/21 audit of South Lanarkshire College”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
We will need to consider what point is the right juncture to bring in the accountable officers, if that is the route that we decide to go down. I will bring in Willie Coffey at this point.
Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
Thank you for setting out that introductory framework. I am sure that you will have read the evidence that the committee took on 3 February. We were particularly exercised by the fact that we are in years 4 and 5 of a distinctive Scottish income tax system but there appear to be what, in our eyes, look like significant gaps in the data that is available and in the evidence that we think is necessary to allow Parliament and the Government to make informed decisions and choices about income tax policy in Scotland.
We are particularly interested in the level of compliance activity that is Scotland specific, in whether there is sufficient—or any—data on the tax gap in Scotland, and in the extent to which the information can be interrogated and analysed, which we think is extremely important in fashioning the evidence upon which we can build a sustainable and effective tax system.
You mentioned service level agreements, which we will return to. We are very pleased that the Scottish exchequer and HMRC are here as parties to that agreement, because we will want to explore that in our questions.
I call the deputy convener, Sharon Dowey, to open the questioning.
Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
Okay—thank you. I am conscious of the time.
We have mentioned in passing the impact of the pandemic. Willie Coffey has a series of questions to ask on that.
Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
Finally, do you have a timeframe for when you expect your discussions and negotiations on the service level agreement to be concluded?
Public Audit Committee
“Administration of Scottish income tax 2020/21”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
You think that they will be concluded by September.
Public Audit Committee
Section 22 Report: “The 2020/21 audit of South Lanarkshire College”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
You outline in the report not just one but a number of headings under which there was a failure to comply with the code of good governance. We have gone through a few of them. The induction of new board members, which Craig Hoy just spoke about, is one example. Another example, which is quite worrying for us as the Public Audit Committee of the Scottish Parliament, is the failure to appoint internal auditors. The existing provider’s contract expired on 31 July 2021 and the appointment of a new provider was not confirmed until November 2021, so there was no internal audit function at South Lanarkshire College for three months. Will you explain why that was and what impact it had?
Public Audit Committee
Section 22 Report: “The 2020/21 audit of South Lanarkshire College”
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Richard Leonard
In those circumstances, would it not have been expedient to roll over the contract of the existing provider until the procurement deal could have been ratified at the appropriate level in the college governance structure? There must surely have been an alternative to a gap with no internal audit facility whatsoever.
