Rural school spending would be one of the National Audit Office's top three priorities this year, the agency said, following an outcry over a raft of deadly school bus accidents that have been blamed on a centralisation push.
The office's auditor general, Liu Jiayi, also said at a national audit conference on Sunday that his agency would seek out irregularities in the social security fund and in government spending on subsidised housing projects.
The office said it was able to help recoup or save 100 billion yuan (HK$122.23 billion) through its audit of 120,000 government agencies and 26,000 government officials between January and November last year.
Liu said his office would conduct a survey on the restructuring of rural schools, which have seen mass closures in the past decade amid rapid urbanisation that has led to dwindling enrolment.
Based on the survey, he said, the audit office would also look into whether special government funds for the restructuring of rural schools had been spent in accordance with official policies.
The central government provided one billion yuan for rural school centralisation programmes in 2003 alone, and it has spent billions on upgrades at centralised township- and county-level schools in recent years.