Agenda item

The Council noted a report of the Chair of the Audit Committee which informed the Council of the work of the Audit Committee during the period September 2018 to August 2019 and how the Committee continued to provide good governance across the Council (for copy see file of Minutes).

In the absence of the Chair of the Audit Committee, the Vice-Chair provided an update on the work of the Committee during the period outlined in the report. The Vice-Chair explained that during the year, CIPFA had updated their best practice for audit committees which had led to the change in the Committee’s Terms of Reference which had been agreed in the previous report.

Three key areas were drawn to the Council’s attention:

·        The work of Internal Audit - the Audit Committee continued to promote and champion the work of Internal Audit across the organisation and had agreed a revised version of the Internal Audit Strategy Charter and the Annual Internal Audit Plan. The Committee had also challenged and supported the work that was proposed and agreed the work programme for the coming year. The work completed by Internal Audit continued to provide assurance to the Committee that the Council’s control environment, governance arrangements and management of risks were sound.  Internal Audit also continued to update the Committee on a quarterly basis;

·        The outcome of the Council’s External Audit of the Statement of Accounts – the Committee received the audit completion letters from their External Auditors. It had been very pleasing to receive an unqualified opinion on both sets of financial statements for both the Council and the Pension Fund. The work of officers from Finance to achieve an unqualified opinion had been a fantastic achievement, particularly given the Council’s size and complexity. The Councils External Auditors had been very complimentary of the Council’s efforts in answering queries and ensuring a timely outcome and an unqualified opinion. The Vice-Chair informed the Council that thanks had been passed onto all those involved in the process;

·        The continuing good work of the Council’s Corporate Fraud Team – the Committee had continued to note the excellent work being carried out in proactive counter fraud work. The Corporate Fraud Team had completed over 481 investigations in 2018/19 including blue badge abuse, council tax, business rates reduction claims, bogus insurance claims and housing tenancy. Over the year the team had recovered £1.3m of public money from fraud. As a result, the team had an excellent local and national profile for their work and had developed strong, partnerships with other public sector organisations which had continued to enhance the reputation of the Council. The increasing profile had seen the team win a national award in March 2019 and had also been nominated for another national award for excellence in counter fraud.

In closing, the Vice-Chair congratulated the team for their work and highlighted that the effectiveness of the Audit Committee was excellent.