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A brand new Inside Audit Division shall be arrange subsequent 12 months as Authorities seeks to reinforce transparency, accountability and good governance in relation to its monetary affairs.
Director of Finance and Financial Affairs Ian Carrington introduced this within the Ministry of Finance’s responses to the Auditor Normal’s 2021 report.
He stated within the 64-page report that provision was made, with the passing of the Public Finance Administration Act in 2019, for the institution of a division “that will improve transparency, accountability and good governance with respect to the utilisation of the folks of Barbados’ assets”.
“Though this has not been executed up to now, as a lot of the nationwide focus has been on the COVID-19 pandemic and different exterior shocks, it’s our intention that this be executed throughout the subsequent fiscal 12 months, 2023-2024,” he stated.
“The Inside Audit Division can even serve to make sure that Authorities’s monetary techniques are sound and that its reporting is updated and well timed with a view to enhancing the general public confidence within the administration of their monetary affairs,” he defined.
Carrington informed Parliament that within the curiosity of transparency, accountability and good governance, the Ministry of Finance compiled and up to date responses to all the points raised within the Auditor Normal’s newest report.
He famous that in doing so, “it was decided, based mostly on the Auditor Normal’s queries and the responses of ministries and departments, that most of the points highlighted within the report might have been settled in a timelier and fewer conspicuous method if the channels for communication and interplay between the Audit Workplace and officers within the respective ministries and departments had been extra vigorously used”.
Nonetheless, Carrington stated that “having undertaken a most thorough assessment of the queries raised by the Auditor Normal in his newest report, lots of our ministries and departments should be assisted in guaranteeing larger observance of the very best accounting requirements”.
“This isn’t due to any particular or overwhelming suspicions of dishonesty on the a part of public officers, however within the curiosity of eliminating reporting errors and omissions, too lots of which had been highlighted within the report and confirmed in our assessment,” he stated. (SC)
