Comptroller’s report - Dysfunction sustained by delusion

THE office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) has, as it has done for many, many years, uncovered levels of performance in public institutions that are hardly acceptable much less exemplary. 

The C&AG yesterday published two reports, one on the process involved in establishing how floods might be better managed and another on how, and to whom, public service severance payments were delivered.

The default defence for underperformance in public bodies — staff shortages, inadequate funding, a bulging in-tray, and too many agencies with a finger in the pie under consideration — will be offered and they may well be justified.