Agenda item

The Chair invited Councillor A Watson, Chair of the Audit Committee to present the report.

Councillor Watson said that it was considered good practice for the Audit Committee to report on its work to full Council on an annual basis and as Chair of the Council’s Audit Committee and he was pleased to present this report.  The report covered the work of the Audit Committee during the period September 2023 to August 2024 and set out how the Audit Committee had fulfilled its role in gaining assurances as to the adequacy and effectiveness of the Council’s governance, risk management framework and internal control environment. 

The report set out details of the various meetings that had been held over the last twelve months and the issues that had been considered at those meetings. There were three key areas of the Committee’s work during the last twelve months that he drew the Council’s attention to:

The first area related to the work of Internal Audit where the Audit Committee had continued to promote and champion the work of Internal Audit across the organisation.  The Committee agreed the Internal Audit Strategy, Charter and the internal audit plan for the year and progress updates were provided to the committee on a quarterly basis.

Councillor Watson was satisfied that the committee provided the appropriate challenge to this process, with a number of officers attending the Committee to provide explanations and answer questions across the year through the delivery of presentations.

Secondly, the External Audit of the Council’s Statement of Accounts the Committee received a report from the Corporate Director of Resources which presented the final Statement of Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2023 for review/approval, alongside the External Auditors report following the conclusion of the 2022/23 audit.  The statutory requirement was for the Council to finalise its accounts by 30 September 2023 but as that was not possible as Mazars were unable to complete their audit review in time, with arrangements made for a public notice to be added onto the council’s website to this effect. The Audit Committee were satisfied that there was nothing the Council or its officers could have done to achieve the 30 September deadline last year as the delay was wholly down to External Audit capacity.

In June 2024 this year, the Committee considered the draft un-audited Statement of Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2024 and the draft accounts were certified and provided to external audit within the statutory deadline.

A verbal progress update report on the draft statement of accounts for the year ended 31 March 2024 was presented to Audit Committee in September 2024 and the final statement of accounts would be presented to the meeting of the Audit Committee in November 2024 for review/approval.

Thirdly, the continuing good work of the Council’s Corporate Fraud Team was highlighted. The Protecting the Public Purse reports considered demonstrated, across the Council, the counter fraud activity that was being completed in order to acknowledge, prevent and pursue fraud under the Council’s Counter Fraud & Corruption Strategy. We had acknowledged fraud as a strategic risk and that prevention was indeed better than cure.

The Council had an excellent local and national profile for its work in this area and the Corporate Fraud Team had developed strong partnerships with other public sector organisations which continued to enhance the reputation that the Council had.

Finally, the report also contained information on the outcome of the self-assessment evaluation of the effectiveness of the Audit Committee, carried out in February 2024 in accordance with CIPFA’s Audit Committees: Practical Guidance for Local Authorities and Police 2022.

The report also highlighted the increase in the Audit Committee Co-opted membership from two to three members with effect from 1 May 2024 following the recruitment of co-opted Independent Members to the Audit Committee earlier in the year.

In summary Councillor Watson reported that whilst the report was largely for information, he considered the effectiveness of the Audit Committee to be excellent and Council was recommended to note the report and the work undertaken by the Audit Committee during the period September 2023 to August 2024.

Councillor Watson Moved the recommendations.

Councillor R Crute thanked the Chair and Vice Chair of Audit Committee, Councillor Watson and Fenwick.  He asked what would happen should a red flag be raised if this did not coincide with the bi-monthly reports to Council from the Audit Committee.  He presumed that any issues would be raised with the appropriate head of service or Corporate Management Team but that in order to strengthen arrangements for red flag issues he suggested that there should be a mechanism in place to also report to the appropriate Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

The Deputy Monitoring Officers advised that regular reporting from the Audit Committee did not preclude any red flag issues being brought to the attention of the appropriate officers and members.  He suggested that any changes in reporting mechanisms would need to be discussed at the Constitution Working Group and brought back to Council with recommendations.

Resolved:

That the report be noted.