Issue - meetings

(Chairman of Audit & Governance Committee) To consider the attached report.

The Director of Governance, C O’Boyle presented a report on behalf of the Chairman of the Audit and Governance Committee regarding the revised and updated Whistleblowing Policy and Procedure.

Report as first moved ADOPTED

            RESOLVED:

(1)        That the revised Whistleblowing Policy and Procedure, attached at Appendix 1 to the minutes be approved.

(Chief Internal Auditor) To consider the attached report (AGC-013-2017/18).

The Chief Internal Auditor presented the Internal Audit Monitoring Report for the period September to November 2017.

The Chief Internal Auditor advised the Committee that three reports had been issued since the previous meeting, all of which had been given substantial assurance: Health & Safety – Lone Working; Council Housebuilding Programme; and Local Plan Staffing Resources. The Audit Recommendation Tracker currently contained 3 recommendations which had passed their due date; one medium priority recommendation for Health & Safety – Townmead Depot, and two low priority recommendations for External Data Transfers.

The Chief Internal Auditor reminded the Committee that a limited assurance audit report had been issued regarding Health and Safety at the Townmead Depot. A detailed action plan was drawn up and good progress was being made to address the issues raised. As part of this, an independent Fire Risk Assessment was undertaken in February 2017 which made further recommendations concerning fire safety. The majority of these recommendations had yet to be actioned, and an interdisciplinary group had been established to address this.

The Chief Internal Auditor reported that the Corporate Fraud Team had achieved the following since September 2017:

·        three further Right-to-Buy applications had been stopped or withdrawn;

·        a further Council-owned property, which had been the subject of a succession fraud, had been recovered;

·        a former tenant had been convicted of two counts of fraud relating to illegal sub-letting;

·        a further Social Housing fraud prosecution was scheduled to go to trial in early 2018; and

·        a joint working arrangement had been entered into with Broxbourne Borough Council, on a paid-for basis, to provide a fraud service for two days per week.

The Chief Internal Auditor stated that the review of the data matches from the National Fraud Initiative for 2016/17 was in progress and Internal Audit was providing training and guidance for Officers to review their matches. Previous exercises had found that many matches were not fraudulent and there was usually a simple explanation; no significant frauds had been identified to date.

The Chief Internal Auditor added that staff within the shared service were represented on a number of business groups and project teams in addition to less formal meetings, to provide advice and guidance, including:

·        the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Working Party;

·        Programme and Project Management;

·        Personal Data (Payroll/HR);

·        the Corporate Debt Working Party; and

·        the Risk Management Group.

Finally, the Chief Internal Auditor informed the Committee that the Council’s Whistleblowing Policy and Procedure had been revised and approved by the Corporate Governance Group. The two main procedural changes were:

            (i)         Timescales – setting out how long an investigation might take; and

            (ii)        Investigating Procedures – to guide staff who might be nominated as           an Investigating Officer.

Staff would continue to be reminded about the Council’s Whistleblowing Policy and Procedure on a periodic basis in ‘District Lines’ as well as through poster campaigns. The Committee was requested to recommend the approval of the Policy and Procedure to the Council.

Cllr Jennings felt that Lone Working training should  ...  view the full minutes text for item 33