Northern exposure

Internal Auditor, Dec, 2004 by Doug Innes

Unfortunately, auditing will not fix what is wrong with the Ontario government ("An Audit Transformation" by Jacques LaPointe, October 2004), notwithstanding the purported transformation of audit.

Bureaucrats and politicians have no concept of what can or cannot be accomplished by a government program. It is more important to be seen doing something than to accomplish anything useful. Consequently, bad and not so bad ideas are funded indiscriminately. The percentage split between good and bad programs is random.

Program managers are valued because they can get a program up and running quickly before an election or to silence government critics, not because they can manage a program efficiently, knowledgeably, or with good internal controls. The percentage split between good and bad managers is random.

Consequently, the chances that a good idea will be mated to good management and deliver results more valuable than the funds expended is a crap shoot. For example: If 50 percent of the programs are sensible and 50 percent of the program managers are competent, it is unreasonable to expect that more than 25 percent of the programs will come close to delivering acceptable outcomes. In such an environment, auditor independence and client satisfaction are incompatible objectives.

DOUG INNES, CIA, CA, CMA

Toronto, Ontario

d.senni@sympatico.ca