Agenda item

4.1  The Audit Manager outlined key points of the report that ran up to December 2023.

4.2  The challenges faced had been with staffing. There was a long-standing Principal Auditor and there were now two Auditors who had come on board in the past six to eight weeks. Recruitment was underway at the time of writing the report, looking to employ another Auditor and Senior Auditor, however this had been unsuccessful; and recruitment is on pause for the time being.

4.3  The percentage of jobs delivered was below target, as expected. They had completed 34 reviews and things were progressing well.

4.4  In relation to the appendices, at the time of writing the report, there were 17 completed jobs with four at reporting stage.

4.5  In point 10 of the report, arrangements in place with counter fraud colleagues in SWAP Internal Audit Services to carry out a fraud risk assessment, which would be delivered in the next 2-3 months.

4.6  There was also an overview review against the public sector internal audit standards, this would be carried out in quarter one of the 24/25 period within the timeframe for compliance.

Comments of Committee Members:

4.7  Mr Reed referred to the SWAP counter fraud team and asked would the results come to Governance and Audit Committee in July this year. The Audit Manager advised that this was correct. 

4.8  Mr Reed also noted that no financial training had been completed and asked was there a risk to the organisation and what were the mitigating actions being taken. The Audit Manager advised that there was a mop-up training session in January, to make up for the period missed, with a high turnout of 40 staff rather than the usual figure of around 10 staff.

4.9  Mr Reed referred to page 18, Appendix B referring to the Audit Managers comments in para 4.4 and enquired if it would be possible to get a snapshot of what it was like 12 months ago to show the direction of travel.  The Audit Manager agreed to provide this.

4.10    Dr Barry referred to Mr Reed’s point regarding risk and noted that 32% of the plan had been delivered to date. Dr Barry went on to ask where the team expected to progress to by 31 March and if that presented risk to the authority. The Audit Manager advised that whilst there 17 of the 48 opinion jobs undertaken by the time of writing the report, the Audit Manager was confident this would change to 36 by year end. In terms of risk, the had mitigated against any substantial issues, such as the delivery of the finance training mop-up session and the Audit Manager was comfortable with expected coverage by end of March. Anything that the team was not able to cover would be carried over into next year’s plan.

4.11    The Chair added that by comparison to the position at the beginning of the year, it was an improvement and the officers had done well. The Chair thanked the Audit Manager and those working for the Internal Audit team.

Recommendation:

The Governance and Audit Committee noted the report.