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Tuesday 7 February 2012

Do as I say, not as I do

Last Novermber, the government did something that was long overdue and published accounts for the whole of government, drawing them up[ on commercial principles.

Today the chairman of the Public Accounts Committee said that the £10.9 billion of unpaid tax that was written off and the potential £15.7bn cost of medical negligence were "gobsmacking".

And she's quite right.  The only fly in the ointment is that she is Margaret Hodge, and the accounts under consideration relate to the last year of office of the Labour government.

2 comments:

Bill Bell said...

They're only looking at the 2009/10 accounts now? It takes some time to draw the accounts up on a commercial basis.

Alex said...

The 2009/2010 accounts were published in November 2011, but considering the whole of government is an organisation that spends £700 billion a year and hasn't prepared UK accounts this way, that isn't too bad. Also the policy wasn't put into place until some time after may 2010, that isn't too bad.