Audit commission to be scrapped??!

[NightLark]

Another pblic sector organisation bites the dust. I used to have such an ambition to work for them. I have read a lot of their reports, can't believe they are all to go. All public sector audits to be competed for by private sector providers from now on.

Bloody, bloody ConDems.

I really can't think what to say. As far as I know they did excellent work, presumably another idealogical hatchet victim.

There are firms of auditors all over the country that could do this work. There's plenty of competition which will keep the cost down. We never needed a separate organisation just to audit public finances.

I hope they next get rid of the new commission that was set up to audit MPs expenses. We should be able to contract out the auditing of 650 sets of expenses privately for a lot less than the £1m or so it was going to cost....

Is this just the start, do we think? If they get rid of all the auditors, no one need ever know how much the government's asset stripping is really costing us.

[Old lefty conspiracy theorist emoticon]

Chil - yeah, right. Pickles works for one of them and says that just ain't true. When you hand government contracts over to the private sector the claims about cost effectiveness rarely stack up. Look at PFI hospitals. Or anything the MoD has ever procured. Or Building Schools for the Future - could have been done far more cheaply without all the 'ooh, we must have private sector partners and a really complicated system akin to PFI hospitals rather than just employ building firms and architects and project managers' nonsense.

We'll end up with a system where firms give Councils soft audits just so that they procure their services again. There'll be no integrity.

Lol at anyone who thinks that the private sector will be cheaper. You get paid more in the private sector as an auditor. You get bonuses. More booze ups and fancy days out. They have to make a profit. So how, pray tell, will it be cheaper to get them to do it?

It's not just financial audit, either. The Audit Commission looks at value for money - the effectiveness of health and local government services. Are there really that many firms in the private sector that have the skill and knowledge to assess entire PCTs? (I've seen some information about what McKinsey's did for the DH and it was bollocks - basically telling them to waste millions of pounds reorganising the NHS yet again into a system that McKinsey's might be capable of understanding...)

Especially given that there is no agreed suitable method to measure productivity in the health service, given it's a bit more complicated than counting widgets. Current management consultancy/right wing think tank bollocks basically says if you set up new services in the community and stop doing so many, I dunno, hip replacements, productivity has gone DOWN even though this may well be better patient care.

There are a couple of points I fundamentally disagree with:

• I am more senior in my private firm than dh (he is with AC) and his total package is worth more than mine in total (largely due to car benefit and pension). most private firms have rubbish pensions (if any). I know of newly qualified accountants in the AC who get a car allowance - none of that where I work for anybody below partner (and my firm is a big one)
• fancy dinners and bonuses for auditors! No chance - we are the engine room of most large firms, not the profit centres. It's the consultancy and other services arms that get the huge bonuses and fancy salaries. Audits generally have seen a huge drop in profits in the last 5 years. It's just not a premium service I'm afraid.
• I also don't agree with the 'soft audit' view. The partners have alot to lose (usually their homes for most of them) and the various regulators are all over private firms these days, PI premiums are at an all time high and everybody knows about high profile auditing scandals. Regulation has gone crazy (again in the last 3-5 years in particular). The AIU have had a go at the AC and they did not come off very favourably either so IMO 'soft auditing' can happen in any organisation.

I do agree that the firms probably don't have all the requisite skills to carry our all of the 'other services' that the AC currently provide, but the simple matter is that they will just recruit the AC staff and get them to do it.

LOL at private sector being cheaper.

Obviously not a direct comparisson but I work(ed) -on career break - for another public sector organisation.

We employ (for example) accountants directly for circa £40k per year. We also use many private firms who second us individuals on a FT basis at a rate of £400 per day. Some of them work for us at that rate for years.

Due to cuts there will be a lot less permenant employees and far more secondees in the coming months.

Cheaper my arse.

Pickles I stand corrected. However I think the AC car allowance thing is madness - this is not something I've experienced in the public sector where I work!

I also maintain my point that I think the private sector will cost more overall. Who will the auditors report to? Someone in central government will want an overall comparison of the LAs etc etc which I assume will mean some part of the AC function will be retained. Also the tendering for all of these contracts - it will take a lot of time and expertise for the LAs to do this. Do they have the skills?

I agree the car allowance is madness and I am bitter about it!

I don't think the private sector will be cheaper overall but I guess the government is banking on the savings from not employing the AC staff, the support functions, the office costs, the central costs etc to outweigh the higher fee the private firms will charge.