Agenda item
Quarterly Assurance Report
To note the quarterly assurance report.
Minutes:
The Head of Audit and Risk Management presented the report. He summarised the work undertaken in the period December 2013 to February 2014 and noted assurance rating of each audit finalised in the period. He also reported the following audit performance:
o Under performance in audits undertaken in quarter 1 had been recouped.
o the Audit Team ensured that all priority 1 recommendations were implemented on time.
o a number of priority 2 recommendations remained to be implemented.
Four limited assurances had been returned and relevant officers were present to answer questions from the Committee.
Assessment and Commissioning of Placements for SEN Children and Young Persons
The Service Head, Learning and Achievement apologised that due to short notice, she was unable to attend the meeting to answer questions. The Head of Audit and Risk Management agreed to respond or, for more detailed answers, refer questions to the Service Head. He advised that:
- The audit examined systems of control and how SEN children were placed in independent schools in terms of clear evidence trails and VFM operated for multiple children places.
- There was good practice in regards to commissioning.
- A limited assurance had been returned because terms of reference were unclear and decision making was affected by poor attendance at Joint Commissioning Panel (JCP) meetings. Additionally he advised that the administration of the business group could be improved, and social workers better challenged to attend JCP meetings.
In response to Members’ questions, the following information was provided:
Concerning where the authority to spend money resided, the Committee was informed that the Local Authority was authorised by the Health Authority. However the Health Authority's contribution was not clearly defined.
Concerning whether the absence of controls placed pressure on social workers to accept particular solutions, the Committee was informed that the service was looking to improve speed of decision-making as delayed or slow decisions might mean that children would have to accept interim accommodation and this could be detrimental.
Management and Control of Markets
The Head of Audit and Risk Management advised that:
o The audit had been carried out to assess assurance on the Control of Markets Framework.
o The procedure for day-to-day management was compliant as was allocation of temporary and additional pitches.
o There were three areas of non-compliance. These were:
– Dealing with arrears - these were not dealt with quickly.
– Subletting - there was subletting of pitches which was a risk factor to the Council. It was also noted that processes were insufficient to detect sublet pitches.
– Public liability insurance cover - in some cases inspectors had accepted lesser forms of proof of insurance cover.
The Service Head Community Safety and Head of Consumer and Business Regulations were present to answer questions from the Committee. The Service Head Community Safety informed Members that efficiency was impeded by the following factors:
o The last Market Panel meeting had been cancelled because accurate information on arrears was not available or provided to the market service from finance.
o Effective recovery of arrears was being hindered by the poor quality of the markets’ data available to the Markets Panel.
o The Markets Control service experienced difficulties with software support provided by Agilisys and support from finance
o There had been issues around reconciling arrears using Agresso financial software.
o The issues were being dealt with as a priority. However the matter not only concerned markets but finance and agresso
o Subletting was a historic issue and additional staff had recently been recruited to address the matter. Additionally two officers had been recruited to look at the markets strategy and to eliminate subletting. It was noted that some markets crossed borough boundaries and here subletting was being addressed jointly with the neighbouring local authority. Management was working on these issues, some of which were linked to other corporate projects
In response to Member’s questions the following information was provided:
Concerning the corporate impact of arrears, the Committee was informed that data management was the factor which affected performance. Accurate / up-to-date data was not available to the Market Panel therefore staff were unable to efficiently pursue arrears.
Concerning what actions THEOs were empowered to take upon discovering subletting, the Committee was informed that the licence conditions stipulate that holders should be present at their pitches and therefore inspectors would need to make several visits to verify the identity of a pitch holder. It was noted verification of subletting and holder identification were resource intensive tasks. Additionally subletting had other impacts such as discovery of thefts and often led to crime investigation.
Where subletting was discovered the licence of the stallholder was revoked.
Concerning whether THEOs were best deployed in this way, the Committee was informed that there was no additional bid for THEO resources since non-accredited THEOs were the original ‘market officers’ and funded by the market account.
The licence scheme was locally based and practices comparable with other local authorities and the Mary Portas initiative.
Management and Control of Trading Standards Evidence Stores
The Head of Audit and Risk Management informed the Committee that:
- This was a follow up audit.
- One of the priority 1 recommendations had been implemented in full and one remained to be completed hence a limited assurance had been returned.
Head of Consumer and Business Regulations informed the Committee that:
- The work of trading standards included the requisition, sample and testing of goods.
- A key issue in this regard was their safe storage and monitoring
- The issue that had been highlighted by the audit was tracking sequestered goods for which APP software was used.
- There had been shortcomings with the software and other methods and software had been investigated. These had also proved unsuitable.
- development work was now being undertaken on the APP software to provide a more bespoke application.
In response to questions, the committee was provided with the following information:
It was expected that the bespoke software would be implemented in July 2014
No prosecutions had been affected by the non-compliance as it was possible to demonstrate / identify whether or not stored sequestered evidence had been tampered with following requisition.
The non-compliance related to tracking goods that had been requisitioned. However trading standards had improved their paper audits so that all items from point of seizure could be tracked from point of seizure to the Court. Officers were presently investigating how this process might be computerised and remain robust.
The bespoke package first trialled had not proved suitable because the system did not permit a spreadsheet to be created which was specific to each individual storage site. Additionally it would not interface with Civica, hence bolt-on software being developed for this purpose and APP Flaire software was being explored
Aids and Adaptions Audit
The Head of Audit and Risk Management advised that aids and adaptions service was comprised of two elements; assessment performed by the Council’s Adaptions Team and implementation of the adaptions which was carried out by Tower Hamlets Homes. He noted that referral and allocations of aids and adaptions were compliant but a limited assurance had been assigned because:
- There was no post-works inspection regime of what value the works gave.
- There were performance issues.
- Some suppliers had not formally signed a contract.
- There was a delay in completion of some of the works sampled.
The Director of Investment Tower Hamlets Homes did not dispute the findings of the audit in broad terms. He also noted:
o A typographical error at page 61 of the report in that THH property services had initiated client post works inspections for 100% major works adaptions active from mid October 2013; the correction was noted.
o That the focus for their works had been on maintaining high standards and quality.
o That the arrangements with contractors had been improved and rationalised; That a post-inspection regime and associated KPIs had been put in place.
In response to Members’ questions, the following information was provided:
Concerning how slippage in time taken to complete the works would be addressed, the Committee was informed that a target time of eight weeks maximum had been incorporated into the KPI's. The Director advised that seven of the 20 aids and adaption works sampled had been completed within 56 working days. Additionally he advised that new targets had been set; these were 10 days for urgent referrals and 20 days for non-urgent referrals.
Concerning why the contracts with Precision had not been signed, the Committee was informed that the contracts were four year framework contracts which initiated in 2012. The non-compliance had arisen because of a lack of follow-through and compliance discipline. This was now being built into the current contracts framework.
The Chair thanked the participating officers for their submissions.
He then noted that four priority 2 recommendations relating to the quality assurance on child protection services remained to be implemented and asked that the responsible officer attend at the next meeting to speak to speak on these outstanding matters.
RESOLVED
That the report to be noted
Action by:
Minesh Jani (Head of Audit and Risk Management, Resources)
Supporting documents:
- 4.1 Audit Committee Quarterly Assurance Report.final, item 4.1 PDF 78 KB
- 4.1a Audit Committee Quarterly Assurance Appxs, item 4.1 PDF 149 KB