Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee 09 December 2025
Good morning, and thank you for inviting me to attend to discuss the draft SSI.
Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd oversees the delivery of rail passenger services by its wholly owned subsidiaries ScotRail Trains Ltd and Caledonian Sleeper Ltd, on behalf of the Scottish ministers. The Scottish ministers are the sole shareholder of Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd, which was established as a company under the Companies Act 2006 and is classified by the Office for National Statistics as a central Government body.
In June 2022, an order was made under section 483 of the 2006 act to require the accounts of Scottish Rail Holdings to be audited by the Auditor General for Scotland. That engages the relevant provisions of part 2 of the Public Finance and Accountability (Scotland) Act 2000. Although ScotRail Trains Ltd is a subsidiary company and therefore part of the Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd group in terms of section 479A of the 2006 act, the order did not extend the requirement for the Auditor General to audit individual accounts. That was due to a lack of resource capacity on the part of the Auditor General at the time. That has subsequently been addressed.
I now seek the support of the committee to progress the draft order to enable the accounts for ScotRail Trains and Caledonian Sleeper to be audited by the Auditor General for Scotland. Currently, the audits for both subsidiaries are undertaken by an external auditor at significant cost, and the order will enable more efficient and effective audits to be undertaken at less cost to the taxpayer.
I am happy to answer any questions that members have.