CIG claims to have completed consolidated accounts

(CNS): Despite revelations by the auditor general about the poor quality and challenges still surrounding government’s accounts for last year as well as this, officials from the Finance Ministry are claiming that they have submitted a consolidated sets of financial statements for the Entire Public Sector by the statutory deadline for 2012/13. Government has not been able to consolidate its accounts for more than a decade because of the massive backlog across public authorities. While progress has been made on old accounts after government passed a law allowing it to miss several years, just one week ago Alastair Swarbrick reported on the continuing problems with the public accounts.

Nevertheless, the government issued a statement Tuesday saying that the ministries, portfolios and offices that comprise central government, as well as the statutory authorities and government companies, all submitted their own individual financial statements to the audit office for examination by the legal deadline of 31 August. The ministry also said that by 31 October it had consolidated 40 sets of financial statements into a single set of accounts that show the results for, and position of, the Entire Public Sector and that the auditor general is required to opine on those consolidated financial statements by 30 November.

Although there are actually 41 entities that should be consolidated, there are many more problems with the claims being made by government in addition to officials not seeming to know exactly how many public authorities government is made up of.

Alastair Swarbrick stated last week that there were still significant challenges and problems with the previous financial years and that the submission of accounts is only part of the story, as government is still struggling to supply the standard and quality of information for his office to undertake proper audits.

In his report published last week he revealed that by 30 September of this year, fifteen months after the financial year end, audits for twelve government entities have still not been completed for the year ending 30 June 2012, which continues to prevent government from publishing the full picture of how it spends tax payer’s money.

Asked about the claims by government yesterday, the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) declined to comment and said that they would be issuing a statement in the near future once the accounts had been made public. However, it is understood that the office continues to work on the government’s first efforts at consolidation accounts from last year, making it exceptionally unlikely that government could have committed anything close to what could be considered auditable accounts.

With accounts still missing from some authorities, many government agencies and ministries remaining qualified or even disclaimed, the claims by the ministry’s officials seem at odds with reality of the situation. Given the pressure that the government is under to straighten out the public finances, the apparent continued inability of government officials to grasp the problems will give further cause for concern for Swarbrick and his team in the face of their continued efforts to assist the government entities in improving their accounting standards and practice.

However, Marco Archer, the minister for Finance & Economic Development, congratulated the Treasury Department for complying with the important 31 October deadline.

See the auditor general's report here.