MEMBERS of the Wales Audit Office have started their review of corporate governance in Guernsey and are interviewing various individuals and accessing a wealth of information before producing a report in a few months’ time.

In essence, all they are trying to establish on behalf of the Public Accounts Committee, as client, is what arrangements the States has in place to facilitate the delivery of sustainable value-for-money services for islanders.

Given that one of the documents the reviewers will access is certain to be the Tribal Helm report which found government here to be profligate and with a tendency to provide gold-plated services, the WAO outcome should make interesting reading.

In its initial media release, PAC indicated that there were six key questions to be addressed. Since one of them is whether the States engages with local people and other stakeholders to ensure what it terms robust accountability, that is likely to highlight the process by which policy is developed and whether people are consulted before or after that policy has been formulated.

In other words, the whole decision-making process, including at what stage funding is guaranteed, is likely to be questioned.

While the States is open to criticism, it is also true to say that it would not take much to make it significantly better – other than a complete culture shift.

The clue to concluding that is in the PAC’s questions, which include reference to transparency, managing risk, accountability and – a killer in revealing whether it adopts best practice in governance terms – does it develop the capacity and capability of States members and officials to be effective?

The absence of performance-related pay in the public sector answers at least part of the question and it is doubtful whether deputies would see their role as needing to embrace continuous learning and development or that there was any suggestion of them, individually or collectively, being incapable.

After all, just being elected is enough, isn’t it?

In the world of good corporate governance, however, it is not and it is just one example of the change of thinking that the WAO’s involvement could demand.