A host of questions remain despite a response by Works and Engineering Minister Derrick Burgess to the Auditor General's special report, according to the Opposition.

The report by Larry Dennis revealed Government had paid millions of taxpayers' dollars including for the new Police / court building without proper controls.

Shadow Minister of Works and Engineering Pat Gordon-Pamplin said yesterday: "Friday's 'formal response' by the Works and Engineering Minister to the Auditor General's special report should concern any Bermudian who expects their Government to be straight with them.

"The Minister delivered a statement which was carefully crafted to confuse the public about a report that sheds light on serious deficiencies and highly questionable conduct in the Government's handling of public money.

"While giving the impression of righteously defending against the Auditor's findings, the Minister's 13-page statement provided no argument or evidence answering the most serious allegations raised by the Auditor."

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which monitors Government spending, has called an emergency meeting to assess the critical report from Mr. Dennis.

Mrs. Gordon-Pamplin, a member of the committee, said in deference to that meeting: "I want to draw attention to the serious issues the Minister did not mention in his lengthy statement". Her questions were:

• Why did the Cabinet award the contract for the Police building to a company that was not recommended by technical officers and that had failed to complete project cost information as required in the bid process?

• Why was work started on the building before a contract was signed?

• Why was excavation work started before an excavation contract was tendered?

• Why did the Government never tender the excavation contract?

• Why was the project started without planning permission?

• Why did the Minister not challenge the report of a Ministry memorandum that said the project start-up was accelerated by politics "so that the public would see activity before the approaching general election?"

• Why did the Minister not explain the contractor's failure to take into account a geological report on rock conditions a failure that caused delays, additional costs and a government decision to pay the contractor those additional costs?

• Why did he not explain an order to change Ministry documents to show that the decision to approve contractor payments was a Ministry decision, not a Minister's decision?

• Why did the Minister not explain a potential double billing, in which nearly $830,000 was paid to the contractor for insurance and performance bond requirements when the Ministry had already paid out $960,000 for insurance and bond requirements at the start of the project the terms of which were still in force?

• Why did the Minister not explain the instruction in October/November 2008 to pay the contractor $384,000 in unsupported cost claims a payment made over the objections of the project's certifying architect and against Government policy?

• From whom did the Minister take legal advice that saw him order civil servants to not cooperate with the Auditor an order that exposed them to criminal prosecution?

Mrs. Gordon-Pamplin claimed Mr. Dennis's findings should be seen against a background that includes Government's "disastrous" management of the Berkeley school project, which led to cost overruns of more than $50 million.