Too many gaps in parties’ funding and spending reports, audit office says

The audit office on Friday said that all political parties had failed to comply with laws governing their income and spending statements for the years 2012-2015.

The report cites failures to submit an amended constitution to the Registrar, failure of party MPs to use the secretarial allowance for its intended purpose, and the allocation of lottery tickets to companies.

Ruling party Disy was told it needed to prepare its financial statements in accordance with international financial reporting standards and submit them to the Registrar in a timely manner.

The report further recommended that the party maintain appropriate evidence for each transaction and adopt appropriate safeguards to identify, correct and prevent possible errors and fraud against the party.

In addition, it recommends that the party, as well as its affiliated organisations, review and modify their statutes to bring them in line with legislation. In consultation with the House of Representatives, the amount of secretarial allowance given to MPs should be fixed at the amount necessary to serve this purpose.

“Both the payment of the parliamentary assistants’ salary and the allocation of the government grant relating to their salary [should] be recorded in the Party’s books of accounts,” it stated.

Meanwhile, opposition parties Akel, Diko and Edek also failed to cut the mustard. The audit office similarly found omissions in these parties’ financial statements and recommended they keep appropriate evidence for each transaction, substante financial data included in their statements, and have the evidence available when requested by the auditor.

The report also recommended that the parties include a clear provision for the body responsible for the preparation and approval of separate and consolidated financial statements and clearly present the actual relationship of the various entities to the party.

Remuneration of parliamentary associates and granting of the state sponsorship should be recorded in the party’s books, the report continued, and should also be properly presented in the party’s financial statements.

Similar recommendations were made for Elam, the Greens and the Animal party.

Lastly, the audit report drew attention to non-publication of anonymous contributions and the non-issuance of a receipt for a non-monetary contribution for the year 2015.