Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold) (Con): The right hon. Gentleman will know that one of the new roles that the Government have given the National Audit Office is to audit the figures in the Red Book following the pre-Budget statement. An increasing task in that Red Book work will be on the alarming increase in debt, which has to be repaid and serviced. Can he give the House an assurance that there will be sufficient resources in the National Audit Office’s corporate plan to deal with that increasing task?

Mr. Williams: At the moment, the corporate plan has an increase of 3 per cent. a year for the next three years. I have received no representations for any extra resources as yet. Obviously, if there were a request, we would consider it.

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