Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

My Lords, I see the Chamber filling up. This amendment is clearly attracting a lot of interest but, just in case noble Lords have come for some other business, let me deal briefly at this stage with Amendment 15, together with Amendment 14 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Touhig. Having reflected on the points made on this issue in Grand Committee, I agree that clarification is indeed merited on this question of the C&AG taking up future offices or appointments. That is why the Government’s Amendment 15 makes it clear that the Public Accounts Commission would specify the person or body, such as the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, that a former Comptroller and Auditor-General should consult before he or she takes up another office or position having left the office of C&AG. We have come forward with that important clarification. Amendment 14, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, seeks to name the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments as the body that former C&AGs must consult. However, there is a difficulty in naming a particular body in legislation because names and responsibilities may change over time. The fact that the body recommended in the original report from the Public Accounts Commission is different from that in the amendment makes that very point. While we need to have a degree of clarification which was not in the original Bill, writing in a particular body that exists now but may not exist in time—and was not that recommended only a short time ago by the Public Accounts Commission—means that we need to have the balance of flexibility but the certainty that the Public Accounts Commission will nominate a body up front. The Treasury has carried out a search to see whether we could find any similar requirement elsewhere in legislation. The only mention at all of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments is in relation to the obligation placed on it under the Freedom of Information Act, so there is no equivalent hard-wiring in legislation of its other responsibilities to deal, for example, with appointments for former Ministers. We absolutely share the noble Lord’s desire that former C&AGs should not just listen to but take to heart the advice of the nominated adviser, just as Ministers and civil servants do. Perhaps it is relevant to say that my understanding of the position of the serving C&AG is that he would be willing to consult any independent authority that the commission nominates about any employment that he proposed to take up after leaving office. This was written into the letter of appointment that he signed before taking up office. What was not written into the letter was a requirement for the C&AG to abide by the decision of the independent authority. It was expected that the decision of that authority would be made public and that that would be sufficient to ensure compliance. In respect of future C&AGs, I think it is fair that they should know which person they needed to consult at the start, before they take on the office. It is expected that the person to be consulted should be specified in the appointment letters of all future C&AGs, which would parallel the arrangements for Ministers and senior civil servants. The terms of the C&AG’s appointment are agreed between the chair of the Public Accounts Committee and the Treasury, on behalf of the Prime Minister, and would have to be signed off by the prospective C&AG before he or she takes up office. I believe that with the government amendment we are bringing forward, along with how I have described that it will work in reality, we have sufficiently covered all the bases intended by the noble Lord’s amendment without getting into a position where we might nominate a body that could be inappropriate in a number of years’ time. On the basis of that explanation, I ask the noble Lord to consider withdrawing his amendment.