Mr. Laurence Bond:

The Deputy is highlighting the point that to some extent, it is inevitable that the nitty-gritty process of focusing on and making decisions on budget items is going to be constrained by the way budgetary politics work. I think that it true. The process may be long or short, or may be constrained in slightly different places. The key argument for proofing is not that it should substitute for this process, but rather that it is to be encouraged as a means of ensuring processes are built into the system of developing budgets so that when the specific point in reached at which decisions come to be made, those making such decisions have before them details of the implications of their decisions for equality or poverty, to be taken into account in the discussion. The key point we have been making is that this cannot be done on the hoof when something is presented on the floor of the House. We believe it has to be built into the process at all stages. That is what is meant by proofing.

Clearly, proofing does not substitute for politics. Proofing is part of the process of working through the issues in a transparent manner and understanding what various decisions imply. It is clear that decisions are ultimately made within a political framework.

In this context and in addition to the role of the oversight committee, Members have a role in setting the terms of the independent budget office.

Deputy Donnelly referred to the important issue of quality control. In some sense oversight is about controlling the quality. It is partly about setting standards for what constitutes good proofing, to which one then holds the Departments to account. For example, I do not want to comment specifically on whether the distribution analysis that is published with the budget is political or otherwise, but it is certainly only a particular way of doing it. The information could include other factors and it could be presented in different ways. To some extent we need to have agreed standards as to what constitutes the kind of information that has to be made available. That is not just a political process, it makes the information transparent and makes the impacts clear. The oversight committee has a role in setting those standards and in seeing they are applied. I also believe - we suggested this in our original letter to the committee - that to some extent the role of the budget office may play an important part in terms of the quality control in that process.

With regard to Dr. Mary Murphy's point-----