A cross-talk broke out in Parliament on Tuesday between Leader of the House Bimal Ratnayake and Committee on Public Finance (COPF) Chairman Harsha de Silva over a proposal to increase the monthly salary of the Auditor General.
The exchange began when Dr. de Silva said the committee would take up the proposal during the day and that the House could deal with it within the course of this week, the Daily Mirror reported.
Minister Ratnayake responded that the committee should give the proposal the green light the same day, so that the House could then improve on it.
Two objections
Dr. de Silva raised a threshold question rather than one about the amount. He said there is an issue over whether the Auditor General can be considered a government officer at all — a classification that determines which salary framework applies to the post.
He also objected to the manner in which the change was being pursued, saying laws cannot be changed simply to please one person.
Carried over from Monday
The disagreement is a continuation of business the COPF left unfinished a day earlier. When the committee met on Monday and cleared a Rs. 71.7 billion relief package tied to the Middle East conflict, deliberations on the Auditor General’s salary — along with wider public sector salary structures — were carried over to a later sitting without a decision.
The Auditor General heads the National Audit Office, the body that audits government ministries, departments and state enterprises and reports to Parliament. The office’s independence from the executive is the reason its holder’s terms of service are set separately from those of the general public service, and the reason the question of whether the post-holder counts as a government officer is not a formality.
