Hundreds of thousands of kilos in emergency Covid funding has been left unspent by the Scottish Authorities and councils, a report has discovered.
Audit Scotland stated SNP ministers had "labored effectively" with native authorities to distribute lifeline money to companies pressured to shut throughout repeated lockdowns.
But it surely discovered there was a scarcity of readability over how some emergency bailouts had been agreed as they had been recorded in another way throughout departments.
Auditors additionally revealed that on the finish of 2020/21 over £2 billion was added to reserves by the Scottish Authorities and councils - however they can not say how a lot of it was from Covid funding.
Finance secretary Kate Forbes insisted the Scottish Authorities had labored "shortly and effectively" to guard jobs throughout lockdowns.
However Scottish Labour claimed that SNP financial mismanagement had left public funds "in tatters".
Stephen Boyle, Auditor Basic for Scotland, stated: "The Scottish Authorities and public our bodies labored effectively collectively to distribute cash through the pandemic, however classes needs to be realized to enhance planning for any future large-scale disruptions.
"It's critical for transparency and monetary planning that the Scottish Authorities and different public our bodies are clear about how one-off Covid funding is being spent, together with cash in reserves.
"Extra work can be wanted by the Scottish Authorities to gather the information that may permit it to know the distinction its interventions have made and plan the nation's restoration from Covid."
Jackie Baillie, Scottish Labour spokeswoman for Covid restoration, stated: "This report lays naked the secrecy and mismanagement on the coronary heart of this SNP authorities.
"Getting this lifeline funding to all those that wanted it was a matter of urgency, however that shouldn’t have come on the expense of transparency.
"The SNP’s financial mismanagement has left public funds in whole chaos, however whilst they forge forward to chop companies to the bone we nonetheless don’t know what occurred to billions of kilos of Covid cash.
"Some companies, similar to Well being & Social Care Partnerships, are sitting on thousands and thousands of kilos of unspent Covid cash that ought to have been directed to serving to folks somewhat than swelling their coffers in reserves.
“The general public need to know precisely what occurred to those extraordinary sums of public cash, so we will trust it reached the suitable folks and delivered what it wanted to."
Finance secretary Kate Forbes stated: "At each stage, the Scottish Authorities labored to safeguard lives, companies, jobs and livelihoods, performing as shortly and effectively as doable to assist folks and companies.
"Regardless of the impacts of the pandemic we labored collaboratively with all sectors of the economic system to establish these most in want, after which with native authorities and companions, to utilise current techniques to make sure monetary assist was delivered swiftly and successfully.
“We additionally arrange quite a few new assist streams to verify companies had been being paid as shortly as doable.
“You will need to bear in mind the severity of the pandemic and that selections had been taken at tempo as we thought-about how finest to allocate funding to assist enterprise and folks by way of the required public well being restrictions."
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