Agenda item

The Committee was requested to view the progress against the Internal Audit Plan 2019/20. The report was to inform Members of the Council’s Audit Committee of the Internal Audit Section’s progress against the 2019/20 agreed audit plan for the first 3 months of the year. The Audit Manager confirmed that the team currently operated with 8 audit staff and at the start of the year there were 7 audit staff.

The main points were as follows:

·                The Internal Audit Team was externally assessed a couple of years ago in 2017/18 and was found to be generally compliant with the Public Sector Internal Audit Standards (PSIAS).

·                The Audit Sections performance was measured against planned work and in the 1^st quarter 2019/20; 18% of the audit plan was completed, as shown in Appendix A. The Audit Manager confirmed that the team were well on target in relation to performance indicators.

·                41 days had been spent finalising twenty two 2018/19 audit reviews; 12 of which have now been finalised.

·                In relation to Quality Control service managers were sent an evaluation questionnaire and generally there had been positive feedback from service managers.

·                Appendix B provided details of audit opinions issued so far for Quarter 1 and Appendix D provided a definition of audit opinions currently given.

·                Two jobs completed to at least draft report stage by 30 June 2019 merited an audit opinion where 1 was Reasonable and 1 was Unsatisfactory.  Other work completed related to the Annual Governance Statement, National Fraud Initiative (NFI),

·                In relation to Service Management Responsibility there had been some training undertaken with managers as they were responsible for addressing any weaknesses identified in the systems.

·                It was reiterated that the Appendices on page 200 summarised the performance indicators which showed that the team were ahead of profile targets.

·                On page 201 under Management Information for 2019/20 Q1, 2 audit opinions were given, with 1 Reasonable and 1 Unsatisfactory with 3 Unqualified which related to Grants. 

·                Page 202 summarised Non-Opinion work 2019/20 Q1 where Civil Parking Enforcement had a High-Risk Rating/Priority.

·                Appendix D summarised the Opinion Definitions from Good to Unsound.

Questions:

·                A Member of the Committee commented on Civil Enforcement Parking and why the risk rating was high. It was confirmed that this project was very important and had very tight timescales with the initial start date of the 1^st July 2019 and it also had a few teething problems.

·                In relation to the unsatisfactory opinion a Member questioned as to whether the Committee would be informed of the outcome. It was confirmed that the follow up would appear in next year’s audit plan and would be brought to the Audit Committee in 6 months in January’s Committee. It was commented that it was a long period of time for an unsatisfactory opinion.

Confirmation was given that the follow up by the Audit team would not be for 6 months or so to get an update, as timescales were sought as well as management actions as managers needed that time to implement changes etc. If issues were still present, then the next process would be to call in management or the Head of Service Area. 

·                It was questioned by a Member that the number of sessions provided to train staff in all areas was 0 and it was explained that there was a session that was meant to take place in May but no one signed up for this and also more sessions took place in July.

Comments were made on the fact that City Services were still coming up as Unsatisfactory. Reference was made to the Letter from the Chief Executive and that more time was needed for the service to resolve the matter, but it was a regular occurrence and Internal Audit needed to guide the Committee to ascertain how much time should be given. It was commented that the Head of Service was new and that this occurred 2 years ago and that the Head of Service was using reports given to them and was encouraging Audit to come in and were using the process to see what needed to be looked at and it was a positive approach.

The Chief Executive has said the above in the letter provided to the Committee and that the process would take time. It was commented by the Head of Finance that the new Head of City Services was working hard but that it was a long way away from where it needed to be.

The Chair gave thanks to the Finance and Audit departments for their hard work.