NIAO report criticises City of Culture bid

A report published today by the Northern Ireland Audit Office (NIAO) into Belfast’s failed City of Culture 2008 campaign has highlighted several serious failings, but commended the “spirit of the bid.”

In NIAO’s view, the findings of both external and internal evaluations indicated that more could have been done at the outset to ensure that all those working on the bid had a clear understanding of what they were there to do, and suggested that some of the difficulties in Imagine Belfast, the company set up to handle the £1.3 million bid, were caused by a lack of staff with the appropriate skills.

The report also acknowledged that the difficulties in identifying suitable staff for the project and the delays in making appointments to some key positions created immense pressures in trying to produce a successful bid document.

“The fact that a bid was put together in these circumstances must be applauded,” the report noted.

However, the report was especially critical of Imagine Belfast’s accounting procedures. Careful to point out that there was no suggestion of misuse of public funds, the report did find a lack of basic internal controls within the Imagine Belfast in the first 12 months of its life.

It went on: “Any organisation spending money on the scale of Imagine Belfast would be expected to have in place basic controls such as documented financial procedures, comprehensive tendering procedures, segregation of duties, hospitality guidelines, proper supporting documentation for expenditure and proper authorisation procedures.”

The report acknowledged the “commitment and hard work” of those working on the Belfast bid, and recommended that the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure should make lessons it had learned available to all central and local government bodies who might be involved in sponsoring any similar project.

(GB)