The National Audit Office of Finland (NAOF) estimates that Finland risks violating those rules of the preventive arm of the EU Stability and Growth Pact which aim at ensuring stable general government finances. The preparation and successful implementation of measures to improve the employment rate play a key role in balancing general government finances.

The themes that will impact audit work in the future are highlighted today in the international panel discussion “Strategic Audit: International Experience” in St. Petersburg.

Sustainable development is given more consideration in the activities of ministries, but it should still be more strongly linked with policy preparation. Finland is committed to promoting the Sustainable Development Agenda adopted by the Member States of the United Nations (UN).

Sustainable development is now given higher priority in the Budget and the ministries’ work. In the future, the ministries should analyse in greater detail whether their activities and the measures they prepare comply with sustainable development. The National Audit Office of Finland has examined how effectively sustainable development has been promoted in central government.

Prime Minister Sipilä's Government allocated a total of EUR 323 million to bioeconomy and clean solutions and set up five key projects. However, the project objectives were achieved only partly. The NAOF assessed how well the key project system promoted the achievement of the objectives. In addition, the NAOF assessed the functioning of the Government's new strategy model and key project system.

The balance between the proceeds of Veikkaus and the prevention of the negative impacts of gambling has generated some heated public debate in the past few weeks. Although the National Audit Office has not audited the operations of Veikkaus in recent years, I found issues that are still topical in our previous audits.

The annual Almedalen Week in Visby, Sweden, is said to be the world's biggest democratic meeting place for discussing social issues. This year, the number of seminars and events arranged during the week was almost 3,600. The programme of the week covered a large number of different subjects, but the trendiest topics were related to digitalisation, artificial intelligence (AI), sustainability, and climate questions.

A consultative approach in auditing has been a recurrent theme in discussions at the National Audit Office of Finland (NAOF) following the NAOF's new strategy and the resulting reorganisation. The idea is that the auditor should have a dialogue with the customer during an audit. This makes it more important for auditors to pay attention to maintaining their independence.