Meeting documents

Audit Committee
Tuesday, 3rd June, 2008 7.00 pm

Date:
Tuesday, 26th February, 2008
Time:
7.00 pm
Place:
Rooms A & B, Town Hall, Bury
 

Attendance Details

Present:
Councillor D M Higgin (in the Chair); Councillors K Audin, C A Berry, A J Garner, D O’Hanlon, S Penketh, K Rothwell and R E Walker.
Co-opted:
Mrs A Brown (Co-Opted Member)

No members of the public attended the meeting
Apologies for absence:
Councillor A Matthews (clash)
Buttons
Item Description Decision
Open
AU.694 DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST
 No declarations of interest were made at the meeting.
AU.695 PUBLIC QUESTION TIME
 There were no members of the public present to ask questions at the meeting.
AU.696 Minutes of the Meeting held on Tuesday, 11th December, 2007 7.00 pm
  • Minutes
Delegated decision:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 11 December 2007 be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair subject to the inclusion of Mrs A Brown being in attendance.
AU.697 TRAINING - BUSINESS CONTINUITY
Preamble for item AU.697
It was agreed:

That The Head of Strategic Finance be thanked for his presentation and that the contents of the training session be noted.
AU.698 EXTERNAL AUDIT PROGRESS STATEMENT
Preamble for item AU.698
Delegated decision:

That the contents of the report be noted.
AU.699 LOCAL AREA AGREEMENT - STAGE 1
Preamble for item AU.699
Delegated decision:

That the contents of the report be noted
AU.700 ANNUAL EXTERNAL AUDIT REPORT
Preamble for item AU.700
Delegated Decision:

1. That the contents of the report be noted.

2. That all the staff in the Finance Section be recognised for their hard work and congratulated on the improvements made.
AU.701 MONTH 9 BUDGET MONITORING REPORT
Preamble for item AU.701
Delegated decision:

1. That the contents of the report be noted.

2. That the hard work of the Officers and Members in achieving the recorded results be recognised.
AU.702 GIFTS AND HOSPITALITY
Preamble for item AU.702
Delegated decision:

That the approach outlined in the report be endorsed and the contents of the report be accepted.
AU.703 ANTI FRAUD AND CORRUPTION STRATEGY
Preamble for item AU.703
Delegated decisions:

1.That Members endorse the nomination of Head of Internal Audit to as the Money Laundering Officer and receive disclosures about money laundering and ensure the Council’s obligations are fulfilled.

2.That Members accept the revised version of the Anti-Fraud and Corruption Strategy.

3.That Members accept the Money Laundering Guidance and its inclusion in the Anti-Fraud and Corruption Strategy.
AU.704 REVIEW OF ETHICAL GOVERNANCE SURVEY - RESULTS
Preamble for item AU.704
Delegated decision:

That the contents of the report be noted.
AU.705 EXCLUSION OF PRESS AND PUBLIC
 Delegated decision:

That in accordance with Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following items of business since they involved the likely disclosure of exempt information relating to any action taken, or to be taken in connection with the prevention, investigation and prosecution of crime.
Exempt
AU.706 INTERNAL AUDIT PLAN 2008/09
  • (Attachment: 11)A report from the Head of Internal Audit
  • |
    (Attachment: 12)Appendix A
  • |
    (Attachment: 13)Appendix B
 
AU.707 INTERNAL AUDIT PROGRESS REPORT
  • (Attachment: 14)A report from the Head of Internal Audit
  • |
    (Attachment: 15)Appendix A
  • |
    (Attachment: 16)Appendix B
  • |
    (Attachment: 17)Appendix C
  • |
    (Attachment: 18)Appendix D
 
AU.708 INTERNAL AUDIT FEEDBACK REPORT
  • (Attachment: 19)A report from the Head of Internal Audit
  
The meeting started at 7.00 pm and ended at 9.45 pm

Preamble

Preamble
ItemPreamble
AU.697Steve Kenyon, Head of Strategic Finance, gave a presentation setting out the Authority’s Business Continuity Plan.

Steve explained that business continuity ensures the smooth running of the Council and the delivery of key services in the event of disruption and sets a framework for a measured and proportionate response to incidents.

Its purpose is to facilitate the recovery of key systems and processes within agreed time frames.

It was explained that the Council was required to have a Business Continuity Plan to comply with the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 and to fulfil an important aspect of the CPA process and Key Lines of Enquiry(KLOEs).

The plan cannot cover every potential incident, but the framework can be applied in all cases.

There is also an Emergency Plan which is a Borough-wide response to major incidents and involves organisations such as the Police, Fire and Rescue service and the PCT. The Business Continuity Plan and the Emergency Plan are separate documents but are aligned and can be activated together if required. The Business Continuity Plan is solely the Council’s response to ensue continuity of core services.

The Plan could be utilised at 3 levels, service, departmental and corporate.

It was explained that a full Business Impact Analysis (BIA) had been undertaken with every service manager to identify critical services, what they are dependent upon and how vulnerable they are to disruption. Each manager had been asked to prepare their own localised recovery plan in the event of a small scale disruption. If the disruption were not able to be contained at the service level, the response could be escalated to a departmental level and then onto a Corporate level if still not remedied.

It was reported that there was a disaster recovery plan for IT and a full duplicate recovery suite was in place at Textile Hall.

Work was continuing on the development of service and departmental level recovery plans with the corporate plan having been completed. All plans will then be collated to form a Business Continuity Manual.

Testing of all plans on all levels would be carried out regularly and the plans would be reviewed and updated when required.

Members were given the opportunity to ask questions on the contents of the presentation and the following issues were raised:-

• Employee re-deployment.
• Reviewing of partner organisations Business Continuity Plans
• Liaison with neighbouring authorities.
• Methods for testing the plans
AU.698Heather Thornton representing KPMG, presented a report updating Members on the ongoing work of KPMG.
AU.699Jillian Burrows representing KPMG, presented a report setting out the findings of a review of the risks associated with the Council’s participation in the Bury LAA that had been carried out as part of the 2007/08 Audit and Inspection Plan.

Jillian reported that the following key findings had been identified:-

•LAA priorities had been aligned with the nine community strategy ambitions of the Local Strategic Partnership and formed part of the delivery plan for the overall Community Strategy.

•Consultation had been held with stakeholders and the community prior to the finalisation of the LAA.

•The LAA was directed by informed decision making both in terms of financial and performance information, which are monitored on an ongoing basis.

•Arrangements were in place to provide assurance over the robustness of performance indicators.

the following key issues had been identified:-

•The Council should ensure that formal rights of access to financial and performance data is in place with all partners in order that Internal Audit can carry out verification visits to audit data submitted by partner organisations.

•The LAA Strategic Risk Action Plan should be developed to identify action plans to control each risk that has been identified, responsible officers for the delivery of actions, and milestone/monitoring deadlines to provide the LAA Management Group with assurance that risks are being managed adequately.

Arrangements for financial reporting should be expanded so that

•the LAA also monitors the financial performance of pooled schemes.

Jillian explained that KPMG would be undertaking stage two of the review of LAA arrangements as part of their 2007/08 Audit and Inspection Plan.
It was anticipated that the review would involve the following:-

•Interview a selection of partners.
•Interviews with local community representatives and other stakeholders
•Interview lead performance and finance leads for the blocks.
•Interview with Members
•Identification of good practice.

Members were given the opportunity to ask questions and make comment on the report and its contents and the following issues were raised:-

•The issue of accountability
•The question of who within the LAA makes decisions and how
•Member involvement
AU.700Heather Thornton presented a report setting out the key messages from the 2006/2007 audit.

The report highlighted the following areas:-

•Accounts and Statement on Internal Control

•Use of resources judgements

It was reported that KPMG had completed their third scored judgement on the Authority’s use of resources. The authority received an overall score of level 3 which means they were performing well.

Two of the five theme scores increased from the previous assessment.

All three Internal Control scores had increased to level 3.

There had been increases in scores on seven of the individual KLOEs, with one of the financial management KLOEs achieving the maximum score of 4.

It was reported that the overall improvement was unmatched by any
other Greater Manchester Authority in 2007.

•Accounting Policies

Heather reported that KPMG had had discussed, risk assessed and agreed their audit plan for the period 2007/2008 with the Authority. The following key areas had been identified for review:-

•Redirection of resources to the Authority’s priorities
•Local Area Agreement
•Major capital projects
•Integrated social needs transport arrangements.
AU.701The Director of Finance and E- Government presented a report updating Members of the Audit Committee on the authority’s financial and performance position in line with the Committee’s Statement of Purpose to ‘provide independent scrutiny of the authority’s financial and non-
financial performance to the extent that it affects the authority’s exposure to risk and weakens the control environment’.

The report showed that the authority was projecting an overspend of £233,000 for the year, based on spending and income information at 31December 2007, however, the overspend could be accommodated within General Fund balances without breaching the Golden Rules, it was explained that, therefore, the position was not seen as a major risk to the achievement of the authority’s ambitions and priorities.
AU.702The Head of Strategic Finance presented a report which updated Members on the system to declare, monitor and report gifts and hospitality offered to and received by staff.

The report presented a summary of declarations made and plotted any trends for the period up to December 2007.

AU.703The Head of Internal Audit presented an updated version of the Council’s Anti - Fraud and Corruption Strategy. The revised version incorporates an Anti-Money Laundering Guidance that had been produced by the Council’s Legal Services Section in consultation with Internal Audit.

It was explained that the Guidance was required to ensure the Council complied with the Government’s Money Laundering Regulations 2007.

It was explained that there would be the need for a Money Laundering Officer and it was felt that this role could be undertaken by the Head of Internal Audit.
AU.704The Head of Internal Audit presented a report setting out the results of the Ethical Governance Survey which had been carried out.

The questionnaire was sent to both officers and members and there was an 18% response rate for each group.

It was explained that the response rate to the survey had been poor and this had been attributed to the design and length of the questionnaire. It was also explained that the sample of officers questioned was too small.


It was reported that the survey would be redesigned and re-issued before the end of the financial year with the results being reported to the Audit Committee at a future meeting.