Agenda item

The Committee received a report of the Corporate Director of Resources which provided details of the work carried out by the Corporate Fraud Team during the period 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022 (for copy see file of minutes).

The Chief Internal Auditor and Corporate Fraud Manager provided an overview of activity undertaken and provided an update on the following:

·      The work of the Corporate Fraud Team;

·      Action taken to raise awareness of the risk of fraud and corruption to assist in embedding a strong counter fraud culture throughout the organisation;

·      Reported cases of potential fraud reported during 2021/2022;

·      Proactive Counter Fraud work;

·      Progress on the Council’s participation in the National Fraud Initiative (NFI);

·      Fraud Reporting;

·      Fraud Training;

·      Covid-19 Frauds;

Responding to a query from Mr C Robinson regarding recording Covid frauds, the Corporate Director of Resources clarified that Covid Grants were time limited to 2020/21 and were not included in the standard Corporate Fraud results table. He added that a separate table would be added to include the Covid fraud figures.

Mr C Robinson further queried the low number of frauds that have resulted in prosecution or sanctions and asked what measure were in place to prevent others exploiting the system. The Chief Internal Auditor and Corporate Fraud Manager advised that the Council has an SLA with various Housing Associations to carry out checks and identify issues, however those individual Housing Associations would issue their own sanction. The Corporate Director of Resources added that the sanction figures identified fraud by Council employees or where fraud had been committed against the Council. He advised that the Council were commissioned to carry out Right to Buy checks on behalf of Housing Associations who would then take their own action. He suggested that further work would be carried out to collect outcome information from Housing Associations.

Referring to paragraph 35 of the report, it was clarified there was a typing error and would be removed.

Resolved:

That the contents of the report be noted.