No board meetings but still paid from public coffers

Members of government-appointed boards, normally partisan appointments made by ministers, received full annual payments even though their bodies held no formal meetings throughout 2023, an investigation by the Auditor General has found.

The findings expose a significant gap, and possibly abuse of public funds, between public spending and evidence of board activity, with some ministries also failing to provide the meeting figures needed to establish whether payments were justified.

In a new report, the National Audit Office said that “in a few cases” members received annual remuneration despite no formal meetings being convened during the year.

Other boards met just once or twice a year but paid members fixed remuneration rather than hourly rates, contrary to the established rules.

The applicable framework indicated that hourly payments would be more appropriate for boards meeting occasionally. However, this approach was not followed.

During the audit, the Cabinet Office, led by Ryan Spagnol, a former person of trust of Prime Minister Robert Abela, confirmed that no payments should have been processed where no meetings were held during the relevant year. Yet ministries had made such payments.

The NAO did not disclose which boards paid members despite holding no meetings, how much was paid or whether any money had been recovered. It also did not identify the members or ministries involved in these particular cases, or quantify the payments associated with absent or infrequent meetings.

The audit also found that, in a couple of instances, ministries did not specify how many sittings had taken place, leaving auditors unable to verify the validity of the remuneration paid.

The findings formed part of a broader review covering 462 government-appointed bodies across 19 ministries.

According to the NAO, the Cabinet Office has now introduced a provision in the Code of Ethics addressing non-payment where no sittings occur. A revised Manual also linked meeting frequency to a body’s category, classification and proposed remuneration.

The Manual has not been published and the OPM refused to provide a copy despite FOI requests.