Minesh Jani, Divisional Director for Risk Management presented his Audit Report for 2016/17. He referred Members to page 144 of the agenda and said paragraph 3.2 set out what the report encompassed. He made reference to the table at 8.3, page 146 which summarised the audit assurance resulting from audit reports in 2016/17. 22% of services had achieved ‘limited assurance’ and Officers from the services were present to answer questions from Members.

Members of the Audit Committee asked the following questions:

·         Were there no ‘nil’ returns?

The table captures information from 2016/17 and there were no ‘nil’ returns. 

·         Referring to Page 148, what does the Committee need to do in order to ensure recommendations from internal audit reports are fully implemented, in a timely way?

The Audit Committee does have a role and if services are repeatedly coming to Audit then it raises questions about how effective Risk Management has been.

o   ACTION: Recommendations arising from audit reports should be referred to the Corporate Leadership Team to ensure they are aware how services are preforming and what recommendations are outstanding.

·                What effect has the churn of staff and interim appointments had on services moving from ‘limited’ assurance to ‘substantial’.

Churn of staff does have a detrimental effect on services, however the Council is moving forward with its transformation programme with services and methodology changing.

·                When recommendations are made how does Audit test the vigour with which the recommendations are implemented?

Audit will always follow up recommendations with ‘follow up’ visits and recommendations are fully reported back to Service Heads and Divisional Directors. The Audit Plan is devised in consultation with Senior Management and takes into account areas of concern. The Best value regime has raised the need to improve Risk Management and the control environment.

The Audit Committee heard further from Officers in the following services:

Management and Control of Parking Permits

Michael Darby, Head of Parking and Mobility Services, informed members that out of the 16 recommendations 6 recommendations were moving forward and 10 were dependant on a new IT system being in place. Mr Darby stated tenders were being sought and it was hoped the new system would be in place by February 2018. Tony Qayum offered assistance in ensuring bidders/providers had the correct risk controls when procuring the PSI system.

It was agreed the ‘follow up’ visit by Audit should take place in April 2018 once the new system had bedded in.

Brady Arts Centre and Kobi Nazul Centre

Steve Murray Head of Arts and Events informed Members that the Service had made significant progress against the 6 recommendations identified by Audit. Members of staff had been trained to use the HR Self-Service Portal to book annual leave and flexi time sheets and sickness records were cross referenced. He said the Centre kept hard copies of the return to work interviews conducted with staff and had tightened up procedures relating to purchase cards.

·         Cllr Hassell asked if issues such as timesheets and purchase cards could be explored under thematic categories.

Minesh stated this was part of the Audit Forward Plan.

Market Vouchers – Follow up

Roy Wayre, Interim Markets Manager, referred to the recommendations on page 163 of the agenda and said he had taken over a fragmented service, which was currently being restructured. The service had reached an agreement with the Trade Unions and was in the process of recruiting to vacant positions. He said the training programme had been strengthened to include legal and enforcement processes and personal safety training.

Mr Wayre assured Members of the Committee that any follow up visit would show the service had made improvements.

Control and Monitoring of Right to Buy Valuations

John Kiwanuka, Housing Partnership Manager addressed the Committee stating the Housing contract was managed by the Council and Tower Hamlets Homes (THH). The six recommendations on pages 166-167 had been addressed. Members questioned how the contract had a seven fold overspend. Minesh Jani explained this was not something the Budget Head would have been able to spot and Neil Issac, Interim Director of Finance from THH explained the oversight occurred as THH officers and the Councils asset management had failed to communicate with each other. THH Officers did not ask about the value of the contract as the company employed was a reputable one who provided concise valuations. The procedures have been tightened up with THH providing a spreadsheet log of all outstanding recommendations, which is discussed as part of their management team meetings.

Highways Repairs and Maintenance – Follow up

No one from this Service was present to answer questions from Members.

Commissioning of SEN Placements

Christine McInnes, Service Head Education and Paternship, referred to the six recommendations made by the Audit inspection, pages 170-171 of the agenda pack and said the SEND leadership and management team had been established to increase capacity and capability of the SEND team. She said the team was undertaking three strands of work: Establishment of the SEND team; SEND area inspection – Ofsted and mapping of referrals and following processes.

Terry Bryan, Head of Pupil Services, stated he was confident if re-inspected the service could show that SEND placements were achieving value for money and assessments were now involving parents and were being co-produced with other agencies involved – i.e. health and education colleagues.

Pensions

Neville Murton, Service Head of Finance and Procurement stated officers had undertaken a repeat exercise to identify former employees who had passed away, but were still in receipt of a Pension. Next of kin were contacted and recovery action was taken to recoup overpayment. However this took time due to legal processes and sometime criminal prosecutions.

Financial Assessments

Members had no questions in relation to this audit assessment.

THH Housing Insurance Claims – Follow up

Ann Otesanya, Director of Neighbourhoods, THH addressed the committee stating THH had made progress since April 2017. She said regular meetings were in the diary with contractors and processes around performance reporting had been improved. She said information on what a Tenant or Leaseholder should expect was on their website and not in the referred handbooks.

Ann also confirmed they had agreed with the Council to turnaround insurance claims within 15 working days and any further follow –up from Audit would show they were compliant.

THH Management of Asbestos – Follow up

Neil Issac, Interim Director of Finance, THH referred Members to page 185 of the agenda and stated that a considerable amount of data had been brought together to ensure Asbestos was managed properly. He made reference to the organisations overarching Strategy and Keystone – the database which holds asbestos records.

Members of the committee were assured THH had implemented the recommendations made and that a log of recommendations recording the speed at which they were implemented would be shared with the Council’s Audit function.

St Luke’s CoE Primary School

Members of the Committee agreed there should be a standard report coming to the Audit committee outlining how schools were preforming to ensure the safety of children, rather than individual reports being received relating to specific schools.

Members of the Committee NOTED the report.