Agenda item

The Committee gave consideration to a report which sought to update Members of the progress made with the 2017/18 Audit Plan. The report provided details of the audit work undertaken during the period; the current position with agreed management actions in respect of previously issued reports; and details of other audit activity relevant to the Committee.

The key messages of the report were summarised highlighting paragraph 3 of the report showing ‘Work in Progress’ which was now completed bar the Flare ICT system review which was due for a final approval at CLT. The overdue recommendations in paragraph 5, showed that some of the recommendations had the date for implementation extended with details of these provided at Appendix 3 and 6. Paragraph 6 showed that the three audits scheduled for quarter one of 2017/18 were underway with detailed provided at Appendix 2.

Summaries of the audit reports issued included Intelligent Client which was Substantial Assurance and the Progress and Delivery, which was Limited Assurance, with a follow up review planned for Q4 to provide further assurance on that area.

The performance details could be found in the table on page 102 and showed a good level of achievement against the targets.

The Chairman commented on the Progress and Delivery (P&D) Audit where there were actions to be undertaken with a follow up audit due later in the year.

The Head of Internal Audit stated that the key thing was to seek assurance from management who were responsible for implementing the actions and proposed inviting the appropriate manager to the next meeting to answer any questions in relation to this.

The Director of Resources and S151 Officer confirmed that management were committed to implementing the actions attached to P&D and that the purpose of inviting Audit back later in the year was to ensure the recommended actions were carried out satisfactorily.

On that basis, the Chairman invited the Head of Paid Service to the next meeting (September), which would be half way into the process, in order that he could update the Committee on the progress made regarding the outstanding recommendations.

Members queried the two paragraphs on page 104 of the report relating to Limited Assurance Risk 2 and Risk 3 wording. In responding, the Head of Internal Audit explained that the two risks in question, which were marked in red in the report, were two risk areas requiring improvement which was why the assurance given was limited.

The Director of Resources and S151 Officer expanded on this explaining that some of the actions were incomplete rather than inaccurate and highlighted that a full review of the original indicators (around 230) set about two to three years ago had been carried out and all of the current indicators, which had been reduced to around 140, were now owned by the current team managers who understood what they were working towards to improve service.

The independent members than queried whether the P&D report was going to be brought to the attention of the other committee Members to make them aware of the situation. The Chairman of the Governance and Audit committee advised that the P&D report had been discussed with the Chair, Vice-Chair and the Leader. The independent member present then proposed that the P&D report ought to be circulated to all relevant Councillors and committees.

A discussion ensued on the best way to address the issue of the members’ ability to scrutinise the available information and whether some additional explanation of the proposed actions in response to the report was required first to ensure the right forum was being used and the right information was being sent out.

The Director of Resources and S151 Officer proposed that the recommendations could be included in the quarter 2 P&D report which would then go to the Prosperous Communities and Corporate Policy and Resources committees.

 It was therefore:-

RESOLVED that: -

(a)          the contentsofthe report be received and noted;and

(b)          having reviewed the content of the report the following identified actions be undertaken in relation to the Progress and Delivery report: -

(i)                                                                                       the Head of Paid service be invited to attend the next Governance and Audit committee meeting (14 September 2017);

(ii)      reference to the Progress and Delivery Limited Assurance Audit be included in the Progress and Delivery report for period 2 and thus submitted to the Prosperous Communities and Corporate Policy and Resources committees.