Last week was a busy one for Sue Winspear.
After nearly nine years as the Cayman Islands auditor general, holding the government and other bodies to account in how they spend public money, Winspear is moving back to the UK. That has meant a hectic schedule of personal and professional farewells, packing up her home and office, and still finding the time to release one final report before she boarded the plane.
Like her reports throughout her tenure, her final report, titled ‘Improving Financial Accountability and Transparency: Long-Term Financial Sustainability’, pulled no punches. In it, she laid out in clear, stark terms, how government’s “unsustainable” spending has outstripped revenues, doubled Cayman’s debt and could threaten the future financial stability of the Cayman Islands.
Both supporters and detractors of Winspear’s work would have expected nothing less from the woman who, in her final annual report released at the end of last year, called government out on a whole charge sheet of poor financial practices, including late and inaccurate accounting, not complying with regulations, not following procurement rules, building up cash reserves that should have been redistributed, incorrect valuations, poor financial controls and understatement of liabilities.
It is small wonder that over the years she has been described variously as “outspoken” and “a fierce advocate”, but she has always retained the courage of her convictions, borne out by a hawk-like attention to detail. At her leaving party at Government House, she was highly praised by Governor Jane Owen who talked of her “dedication, hard work, leadership and the way you’ve worked with so many different communities and stakeholders on the island”.
“What we do is evidence based,” said Winspear, speaking to the Compass in her final interview in the auditor general’s role.
“There’s nothing personal in it. We explore, audit and come up with answers based on evidence. I give judgments, and I don’t shy away from concluding what I conclude, which is sometimes, to coin a phrase, ‘an inconvenient truth’ to some people.”
She added, “I will not shy away from the difficult messages that sometimes have to be given. … Many people are pleased with the things that I report, and many people are not pleased with the things I report. It’s just in the nature of the work. You do everything without fear, or favour, no matter who it is.”
Confident reporting
She admitted that there have been times when people have objected to her findings, but she has always relied on evidence to back up her reports.
“I always feel confident in what I’m reporting,” she said.
“It’s a great armoury to have when you base it all on fact.”
Winspear does accept that some topics are destined to be controversial, however facts-based they are.
“We’re not actually looking at policy,” she said.
“We’re looking at the implementation of policy. But because so much is about value and value for money, if you’re suggesting there isn’t good value coming out of public spending, then I can understand why the politicians would take it personally.”
She explained, “Whether or not we should have a cruise berth, whether or not we should have the East-West Arterial road, that’s not my concern.
“Of course, people get drawn into the policy and the policy choices, and you can find things in there that would support a [certain] view or not. And if you believe in evidence-based policy making, then you know that the evidence may be contrary to the policy that’s been adopted by the government, but I’m not looking at that. I’m looking at the implementation.”
Other controversial topics which Winspear and her 28-strong team have issued reports on in the past include the airport redevelopment and the ReGen waste management contract.
“You definitely need a thick skin and be able to rise above the emotion of it all,” she said.
Winspear took up the role of auditor general in July 2016 having worked for many years in the UK Government, most recently at the National Audit Office. One of the first things she tackled was the lack of rules around procurement.
“We were finding that government was awarding big contracts just directly to one supplier,” she said.
“Clearly that risks value for money, because you’ve got no alternative quotes to compare them to.”
Risk of fraud
Not only that, she pointed out, there’s the risk of fraud and corruption when you do not go through an appropriate process. Now, she says with understandable pride, after much pushing from her office, there’s a Procurement Act and a Public Procurement Committee, which governs how contracts are awarded and approved.
Winspear was also instrumental in the creation of the Standards in Public Life Act and its related Commission for Standards in Public Life.
“That should reduce the chances of nepotism, cronyism, fraud and corruption. It’s all about being more transparent and accountable to the public,” she said.
One achievement Winspear is particularly happy about is her work on election financing, which led directly to the rules that are in place for the upcoming general election.
“Our report showed that there was a lot of controversial and fairly high profile stuff that happened just before the election in the pre-election period,” she said.
“In most countries around the world, after an election is called, you stop doing anything controversial. You stop controversial new hires, new policies being implemented, [but here] there was none of that.”
This resulted in several major policies being rushed through before elections, such as the ReGen project, signed just weeks before the 2021 general election.
“There weren’t rules [in place] so nobody did anything wrong,” Winspear said.
“But in terms of natural justice and fairness of an election, you need to make it fairer for those that aren’t in the current government to sort of compete.”
Financial scrutiny
A particularly crucial part of Winspear’s role was to scrutinise the financial management of the country every year, by way of 47 audits of 19 government ministries, portfolios and offices, 26 statutory authorities and government companies, Parliament and the entire public sector account.
In practice, this means Winspear probes the accounts of entities as diverse as the Ministry of Health, Cayman Airways, Cayman Islands Monetary Authority and Cayman Turtle Centre, giving her a unique perspective of which wheels in the machinery of government are turning more effectively than others.
While there is a significant backlog in some departments, caused by some accounts being many years in arrears or containing such a large amount of deficiencies and errors that they should be considered unreliable, there has been significant progress in others.
“The quality and the timing of the 47 entities that make up the entire public sector, their accounting and their financial statements and the audit opinions that I give have improved beyond measure,” said Winspear, while agreeing that there is still huge room for improvement.
For example, she said, “I’ve made tons of recommendations on budgeting. Government companies are supposed to operate at profit [but] many of them don’t, or many of them don’t without government support.”
Cayman Airways is a case in point, she said. Flights between the three islands are considered an essential lifeline and are subsidised by government, but other routes should be profitable, and other routes are subsidised but not at the correct level.
“There needs to be a clearer understanding of what the government is funding,” she said, adding that instead of having to supplement its budget every year, “just fund it properly in the first place”.
Looking ahead
What advice does Winspear have for her successor, who is yet to be appointed?
“We need a separate auditor general act,” she said immediately.
“We haven’t got one, and we need that to protect our independence.”
She admitted that the last budget cycle was “a difficult one,” because there were some attempts by government to reduce the budget of the Office of the Auditor General.
“I managed to resolve that,” she said diplomatically, “but, know, as an independent oversight body, it’s really important that the executive can’t interfere. I’m not suggesting they were trying to starve me of resources so I couldn’t do the work, but, you know, taking half a million out of a budget is quite a big thing, and it shouldn’t be determined by the executive.”
Mingling with the crowds at Winspear’s leaving party at Government House was Ombudsman Sharon Roulstone, who occupies a similar oversight role.
“We are very supportive of each other,” Winspear said.
“I think because they’re quite lonely jobs, and they’re not very popular jobs, because we’re recommending improvement as much as we try and be balanced about it.”
‘I want Cayman to be better’
“It’s pretty rare that you get a thank you,” she admitted.
“You do get satisfaction with the job, because you see things change, but there’s an awful lot of negativity that comes with it and, you know, they’re not the best paid jobs in the world … but I love it, because you do feel like you are making things better, and that’s the only thing that drives and motivates me.
“I want Cayman to be better, and that’s not me saying what the policies should be. That’s for the electorate and the government to decide. But what you do want, when there is a decision about how they are going to do something, is that it’s implemented effectively.”
While Winspear has unquestionably changed public accountability in her years on island, there are some things which haven’t yet fallen into place.
“There are lots of things that I’ve recommended consistently through my time here, and many recommendations got implemented, but I have to be honest and say there are far too many recommendations that haven’t been implemented,” she said.
Need to plan for the long term
As she explained in her final report, long-term planning in Cayman is sorely lacking. What is needed, in her opinion, is a national development plan and a capital investment plan.
“Long-term planning for the country, for the infrastructure, for the things we need, for capital projects, is lacking and that drives so much of the public spending and government and government finances,” she said.
Another frustration is a budgeting system, which Winspear has also recommended many times.
“We don’t look at the outcomes we’re trying to achieve for Cayman,” she said.
“It’s all about outputs, and it doesn’t necessarily drive the best value. I’m not saying it’s an easy fix, but it is really important.”
Parliament needs to sit more frequently so things get done more quickly, such as the tabling of reports, and there needs to be a tightening up of anti-corruption rules and the enforcement of the Standards in Public Life commission, she said.
“I’m talking about my frustrations and you might think, this is terrible,” Winspear said.
“But we are in a really strong position. There is no doubt that in the Caribbean we are one of the strongest economies, that’s a given. But in terms of governance, in terms of auditing, our office is regarded very, very highly in the Caribbean. So please be proud of what Cayman has achieved. What I’m talking about is further improvement, but we are in a really good place.”
Work aside, what will Winspear miss about life in the Cayman Islands?
“The people are lovely, the place is lovely, everything about it is just perfect,” she answered.
“I’ve got three children that spent their formative years here and still regard this as home. It’s been an absolute pleasure and privilege to be here.”
Winspear, who is in remission from cancer, has a few weeks in the UK before spending a month on a well-deserved holiday in New Zealand with her husband. As far as the future goes, she would love to be involved in the Auditors Oversight Authority in a non-executive role — even auditors need auditing — and also to spend more time indulging her hobby, motorbikes.
“I’ve got my motorbike licence,” she said.
“I’m a bit of a rock chief. When I go back, I’m going to get myself a bike.”
