Public Accounts Committee (United Kingdom)
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The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) (strictly, the Committee of Public Accounts) is a select committee of the British House of Commons. It is responsible for overseeing government expenditures to ensure they are effective and honest. The PAC is seen as a crucial mechanism for ensuring transparency and accountability in government financial operations, having been described by Professor Peter Hennessy as "the queen of the select committees...[which]...by its very existence exert[s] a cleansing effect in all government departments."
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[edit] Overview
The recommendation for the creation of a committee to oversee government accounts was first put forward a hundred and fifty years ago - in 1857 - by a small group of interested Members of Parliament lead by Sir Francis Bearing.
The structure and function of the PAC date back to reforms initiated by William Gladstone, when he was British Chancellor of the Exchequer in the 1860s. The first PAC was established in 1861 by a resolution of the British House of Commons:
"There shall be a standing committee designated "The Committee of Public Accounts"; for the examination of the Accounts showing the appropriation of sums granted by Parliament to meet the Public Expenditure, to consist of nine members, who shall be nominated at the commencement of every Session, and of whom five shall be a quorum" 31 March 1862
The form has since been replicated in virtually all Commonwealth of Nations and many non-Commonwealth countries.
Today's Public Accounts Committee consists of sixteen members. Members are nominated at the beginning of each Parliamentary Session on the basis of a motion made by a Government minister, after consultation with the Opposition. Changes in membership are made from time to time during the Session, oftn because Members have become Ministers orfront-bench oppositon spokemen.
The party proportions of the Committee, like other committees, are the same as in the House. At present this gives nine Labour; five Conservative; and two minority party members (at present Liberal Democrats)
A Minister from Her Majesty's Treasury sits on the committee but, by convention, does not attend hearings. Currently this is the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, Angela Eagle MP, but previously it has been the Financial Secretary to the Treasury.
The Committee chooses its own Chairman (currently Edward Leigh), traditionally an Opposition Member. The Committee is assisted by the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG), who is a permanent witness at its hearings, along with his staff of the National Audit Office, who provide briefings on each report and assist in the preparation of the Committee's own reports.
[edit] Members
Committee membership, as of December 2007.[1]
| Member | Party | |
|---|---|---|
| Richard Bacon MP | Conservative | |
| Annette Brooke MP | Liberal Democrats | |
| Angela Browning MP | Conservative | |
| David Curry MP | Conservative | |
| Ian Davidson MP | Labour Co-operative | |
| Philip Dunne MP | Conservative | |
| Angela Eagle MP | Labour | |
| Nigel Griffiths MP | Labour | |
| Keith Hill MP | Labour | |
| Edward Leigh MP (Chair) | Conservative | |
| Austin Mitchell MP | Labour | |
| Dr John Pugh MP | Liberal Democrats | |
| Angela Eagle MP | Labour | |
| Geraldine Smith MP | Labour | |
| Don Touhig MP | Labour | |
| Alan Williams MP | Labour | |
| Phil Wilson MP | Labour | |
[edit] Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (1861-2008)
| Year | Chairman | Party |
|---|---|---|
| 1861-63 | Sir Francis Tornhill Bearing | Liberal |
| 1864-1866 | Rt Hon Edward Pleydell Bouverie | Liberal |
| 1866 | Mr George Sclater-Booth | Conservative |
| 1867-68 | Mr Hugh C E Childers | Liberal |
| 1869 | Mr William Pollard Urquhart | Liberal |
| 1870-71 | Rt Hon George Ward Hunt | Conservative |
| 1872-73 | Mr George Sclater-Both | Conservative |
| 1874-76 | Rt Hon John George Dodson | Liberal |
| 1877-1880 | Lord Frederick Cavendish | Liberal |
| 1884-85 | Sir Henry Holland | Conservative |
| 1886 | Sir John Eldon Gorst | Conservative |
| 1887-88 | Sir John Lubbock | Liberal Unionist |
| 1889-92 | Sir Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth | Liberal |
| 1893 | Mr Edmond Wodehouse | Liberal Unionist |
| 1894-95 | Sir Richard Temple | Conservative |
| 1896-1900 | Mr Arthur O'Connor | Irish National |
| 1901-05 | Rt Hon Sir Arthur Hayter | Liberal |
| 1906-08 | Rt Hon Victor Christian William Cavendish | Liberal Unionist |
| 1908-18 | Col Robert Williams | Unionist |
| 1919-20 | Rt Hon Sir Francis Dyke Acland | Liberal |
| 1921-22 | Mr Aneurin Williams | Liberal |
| 1923 | Mr Frederick William Jowett JP | Labour |
| 1924 | Lt Col Rt Hon Walter Edward Guinness | Conservative |
| 1924-29 | Rt Hon Willian Graham JP | Labour |
| 1929-31 | Mr Artur Michael Samuel | Conservative |
| 1931-38 | Mr Morgan Jones | Labour |
| 1938-41 | Rt Hon Frederick William Pethick-Lawrence | Labour |
| 1941-43 | Lt Col Rt Hon Walter Elliot | Unionist |
| 1943-45 | Lt Col Sir Assheton Pownall OBE TD | Unionist |
| 1946-48 | Rt Hon Osbert Peake | Conservative |
| 1948-50 | Mr Ralph Assheton | Conservative |
| 1950-51 | 1, Sir Ronald Cross; 2, Rt Hon Charles Waterhouse | Conservative |
| 1951-52 | Mr Lewis John Edwards | Labour |
| 1952-59 | Sir George Benson | Labour |
| 1959-63 | Rt Hon Harold Wilson | Labour |
| 1963-64 | Rt Hon ALN Douglas Houghton | Labour |
| 1964-70 | Rt Hon John Boyd-Carpenter | Conservative |
| 1970-73 | Rt Hon Harold Lever | Labour |
| 1972-73 | Rt Hon Edmund Dell Acting due to Lever's illness | Labour |
| 1974-79 | Rt Hon Edward DuCann | Conservative |
| 1979-83 | Rt Hon Joel Barnett | Labour |
| 1983-97 | Rt Hon Robert Sheldon | Labour |
| 1997-2001 | Rt Hon David Davis | Conservative |
| 2001-Present | Mr Edward Leigh | Conservative |
[edit] See also
- Select Committee (Westminster System)
- British House of Commons
- List of Committees of the United Kingdom Parliament
[edit] References
- David McGee, The Overseers – Public Accounts Committees and Public Spending, Pluto Press, London 2002.
- Stapenhurst, Rick; Sahgal, Vinod; Woodley, William; Pelizzo, Riccardo; World Bank, 1 May 2005, Policy Research Working Paper WPS3613, Scrutinizing public expenditures: assessing the performance of public accounts committees
- Pelizzo, Riccardo, Stapenhurst, Rick, Saghal, Vinod and William Woodley, What Makes Public Accounts Committees Work?, Politics and Policy, vol. 34, n. 4, December 2006. pp. 774-793.
- Riccardo Pelizzo and Rick Stapenhurst, Strengthening Public Accounts Committees by Targeting Regional and Country Specific Weaknesses, in Anwar Shah (ed.), Performance Accountability and Combating Corruption, Washington DC, The World Bank, 2007, pp. 379-393.
- Jacobs, K. 1997. ‘A reforming accountability’, International Journal of Health Planning and Management 12: 169-85.
- Jacobs, K.1998. ‘Value for money auditing in New Zealand: competing for control in the public sector’, British Accounting Review 30: 343-360
- Jones, C. 1987. ‘The Origins of the Victorian Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee’, MA, University of Melbourne.
