Category: Audit and Risk Management

Audit & Risk Management Committee (Wirral Council) 29th November 2011 Part 2 Budget Projections 2012-2015

Cllr Simon Mountney also asked about the processes in place. David Taylor-Smith said it was a decision of the administration, they were provided with the information which was then discussed. The Budget would be set by the statutory deadline. Cllr Simon Mountney asked about actions taken by officers. David Taylor-Smith said that there were a … Continue reading “Audit & Risk Management Committee (Wirral Council) 29th November 2011 Part 2 Budget Projections 2012-2015”

Cllr Simon Mountney also asked about the processes in place.

David Taylor-Smith said it was a decision of the administration, they were provided with the information which was then discussed. The Budget would be set by the statutory deadline.

Cllr Simon Mountney asked about actions taken by officers.

David Taylor-Smith said that there were a number of processes. There was the Budget Simulator which was running to the 30th November. The administration was making deliberations.

Cllr Simon Mountney said the decisions were based on a game?

David Taylor-Smith said there were assumptions and the report was a projection. It had been quickly revised over the 1% in 2013. There were also implications for Housing Benefit. He asked if Cllr Simon Mountney wanted him to share such matters with the Chair and spokespersons? He said the Budget Projections was a regular report to Cabinet and the latest projections would be in the next report. There had been announcements today but the next meeting would be mid January.

Cllr Ron Abbey asked if there was signficant movement then it should be shared with the Chair, Deputy Chair and spokespersons, as the longer it was delayed the less time they had.

Cllr Alan Brighouse asked if there were enough resources to fulfill the requirements of the Budget process?

David Taylor-Smith said it was kept under regular review.

Cllr Jim Crabtree asked what officers were doing to stay within projected budget spends?

David Taylor-Smith said that was up to individual Chief Officers. The budget allocations went to Cabinet along with assurances. He was happy to take specific instances to Chief Officers.

Cllr Jim Crabtree and the committee agreed the report and moved to item 4 (Internal Audit Update).

Audit & Risk Management Committee (Wirral Council) 29th November 2011 Part 1, Declarations of Interest, Minutes (28/9/2011), Budget Projections 2012-2015

Present:

Labour
Cllr Jim Crabtree (Chair)
Cllr Darren Dodd (Vice-Chair)
Cllr Irene Williams
Cllr Ron Abbey

Conservative
Cllr Simon Mountney (Spokesperson)
Cllr James Keeley
Cllr Sue Taylor (deputy for Cllr Jeff Green)

Liberal Democrat
Cllr Alan Brighouse (Spokesperson)

Officers present
Tom Sault
Surjit Tour (Legal adviser)
Mark Delap (Committee Clerk)
David Taylor-Smith

Also
Mike Thomas (District Auditor)
Liz Temple-Murray (Audit Commission)

Surjit Tour after talking with the Chair Cllr Jim Crabtree left the room. Mike Thomas said that agenda item 9 (Audit Commission) HESPE Follow Up Report would not be dealt with tonight.

Cllr Jim Crabtree said he would like to make a start and welcomed people to the meeting. He asked for any declarations of interest. None was declared. The minutes of the meeting held on the 28th September 2011 were agreed.

David Taylor-Smith introduced the Budget Projections 2012-2015 report. He said it was a regular report to Cabinet and referred to page nineteen, which dealt with the shortfall in each of the next three financial years. There were processes to address the issues rather than debate over how the shortfall would be found. He asked for any questions.

Cllr Jim Crabtree invited Cllr Darren Dodd to speak.

Cllr Darren Dodd asked him to “tell us more about the processes in place”?

David Taylor-Smith said the Director of Finance reported to the Cabinet meetings. He said the Cabinet and the Executive behind the scenes had regular debates over planning and how the [Labour] administration responded to the reports was up to them.

Audit & Risk Management Committee 28/9/2011 Part 4

Mike Thomas continued by saying there were a range of issues on pages 38 to 42 which relate to earlier years, which needed to be attended to. There was a recommendation on page 42. There were weaknesses in internal control. He asked the committee to check the quality of the financial statements as there were a significant number of amendments. Project management could be better and the Quality Review dealt with the Value for Money conclusions.

The appendices detailed the changes to the draft, included the unadjusted misstatement of £6 million. There was also a glossary and an Action Plan.

Tom Sault said there was an updated letter of representation with one amendment which was Appendix 6.

Cllr Green asked which one and said he had questions.

Mike Thomas said the appendix replaced page 36, which was drafted on 6th September. The addendum was answering the outstanding questions, the major one outstanding was issue 6.

Cllr Green referred to the qualified Value for Money conclusion. He asked about the £6 million and why it had not been project managed to completion. Which pages were changed he asked?

Mike Thomas said the update was to page 36. The other was to do with appendix 1 of the draft auditor’s report. On the 6th September it changed.

Cllr Green said it had got to be signed off and agreed by Friday and he had only been told on Monday.

Mike Thomas said they were still receiving information. The £6 million was complex and required unwinding to correctly analyse. The amendments wer late, they had worked with council officers to do this by the deadline but timescales had slipped.

Audit & Risk Management Committee 28/9/2011 Part 3

He said this had caused the issue of the deadline for approval not being met, there needed to be improvements to working papers and in non-current assets. However the impact had not changed the General Fund balance. The last stages would be there by Friday along with the £6 million change.

However the £6 million change could have an impact on many other figures. This wouldn’t lead to the accounts being qualified but was still an issue. He said there were Value for Money weaknesses in internal control. The opinion was unqualified except for certain items. Wirral Council had to prove value for money on the HESPE contract, there were governance issues at the Department for Adult Social Services, governance issues at the Technical Services Department and whistleblowing needed to be improved.

He confirmed that the son of someone on his audit team works for Wirral Council and that another team member had a relative who had dealings with Wirral Council with respect to buildings, planning and land.

He referred to page 35 and issues to consider and agree as well as page 36. The £6 million was still an issue. Item 2 referred to final adjustments. The amended statements would be agreed tomorrow. The Annual Governance Statement was to be considered by Internal Audit.

Paragraphs 3, 4 and 5 detailed the £6 million which had originally been £9.5 million. However out of the £15.975 million they had reanalysed £10 million. The Value for Money conclusion, letter of representation, opinion and Value for Money statement unless there were outstanding objections, they would need to review before the certificate and before they close things done. Changes had to be made before final approval.

Audit & Risk Management Committee 28/9/2011 Part 2

Tom Sault introduced the Statement of Accounts covering report and Appendix. He said the Merseyside Pension Fund was part of the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral’s accounts and this was a recommendation from the Pension Committee. There was the report to the District Auditor, Annual Governance Statement and letter of representation as well as the Action Plan. It had been signed off and there had been a briefing in July.

Unfortunately it had been published on the 4th July instead of the 30th June, which was behind the deadline. These would be formally published by the 30th September. They would get the auditor’s report in the next couple of days. There was an adjustment to one outstanding item, which was likely to happen by the end of the day. It was to do with a complex issue affecting £6 million of capital grants. This had no effect on the bottom line. There was an adjustment to two accounts, one being the technical services department with regards to how assets are treated under the International Financial Reporting Standards. This had no effect on the bottom line, but lessons had been learnt.

Cllr Crabtree asked Mike Thomas to respond.

Mike Thomas said the key messages had been issued in a supplement to page 36 and went on to talk about value for money, internal control weaknesses and key matters. He said it had been a challenging year in the public sector. He was still of the view that it was an unqualified opinion. He thought project management could be better and they needed to manage the process better.