Agenda item

The Leader introduced the first report on the Council’s Corporate Risk Register for the end of Quarter 3 (1 October to 31 December 2023).

The Leader noted with colleagues that Cabinet review the risks; whilst Governance and Audit Committee review the risk management arrangements and governance processes and may provide their comments back to Cabinet following consideration of the Quarter 3 risk report at their meeting later this month.

At the end of Quarter 3, the Authority had 43 risks recorded across the Council’s eleven service areas.

Those risks that were deemed to pose the most significant risk in the delivery of the Council’s Corporate Plan and its services were escalated to the Council’s Corporate Risk Register for monitoring.

At the end of Quarter 3, 15 risks were recorded in the Corporate Risk Register.

·        8 Severe Risks (15 to 25).

·        7 Major Risks (7 to 14).

In comparison to the Quarter 2 Corporate Risk Register, one risk - completion of the Internal Audit plan - had decreased from 16 to 9 following the progress made by the Council’s Internal Audit service. The Leader was pleased to report this back to Cabinet.

The remaining 14 risks were reported with the same risk score as Quarter 2.

Comments of Cabinet Members:

§  Councillor Davies noted that that the demand for additional learning needs (ALN) and specialist educational needs (SEN) remained at amber as there was an increasing number of children within Newport being diagnosed with ALN. This is not unique to Newport and appeared to be due to a range of factors. Councillor Davies mentioned that the service area was working hard with schools to provide assistance and support where necessary, whilst recognising that more funding was needed. As a consequence, Councillor Davies welcomed the additional £300,000 that was announced at the previous Cabinet meeting that would be used specifically to support these children.

§  Councillor Lacey mentioned the assets and property estates which had increased risk from Quarter 1 2023-24 into Quarters 2 and 3 of 2023-24 from 16 to 20. While Councillor Lacey welcomed the additional sums of £200,000 into this area it must be noted that the maintenance backlog of Council buildings currently stood at £100M.  Alongside other challenges of maintenance of these buildings owned by the Council, the decarbonisation project was also being managed across the estate. A new strategic asset management plan was being developed, supported by asset rationalisation, and was therefore hoping to manage the risks as best as possible.

§  Councillor Forsey noted that the number one risk was in children services.

§  Councillor Marshall echoed comments of colleagues about the risk factors in social services and reassured colleagues that the service area was looking at the best possibilities to mitigate it, including work involving investments.

§  The Leader thanked colleagues for their contributions and hoped this made clear that, as a Cabinet, the understanding of the risks to the authority and the delivery of statutory services and corporate plan was demonstrated. In addition, Cabinet was able to address risk by putting in place mitigations to help manage the potential impacts.

Decision:

Cabinet considered the contents of the Quarter 3 update of the Corporate Risk Register and identified the risks.