Agenda item

That the progress made in implementing the actions from the original report be noted.

The Internal Audit Manager presented a report on the outcome of the follow-up review undertaken in response to the findings of the Wales Audit Office (WAO) in the Audit of Financial Statements report considered in September 2015.  Following consideration at that meeting, the follow-up review by Internal Audit had been brought forward to share the findings and give assurance to the Committee, along with other actions from the WAO review.  The report indicated that substantial progress had been made by Employment Services and Payroll to implement most of the recommendations, some ahead of schedule, with work on the remainder underway.

The Chief Executive explained that the Chair and Vice-Chair had been briefed on the outcomes and confirmed that Sharon Carney was the Interim Human Resources and Organisational Development Manager.  As a result of the concerns raised, the establishment of a project group had helped to make progress in putting in place more robust arrangements.  The issues involved a number of complexities but were not about accuracy of payroll payments, and the process was particularly important in respect of Single Status.  The Chief Executive added his appreciation to WAO for raising the concerns to eradicate any risk for future accounting.

Mr. Paul Williams thanked the Chief Executive and officers for their rapid progress and for the new actions added by the Internal Audit Manager.  He referred to the request for employees to complete the ‘Reporting Manager’ fields on the iTrent reports and felt that this should be a stronger directive to Chief Officers for their employees to provide this information.  The Internal Manager said that progress on this action was indicated in the follow-up report and that the need to complete this action would be stressed.  The Chief Executive agreed that an instruction would be issued to require responses back by 31 March 2016 with any incomplete records to be followed up with Chief Officers.

Councillor Alison Halford expressed concern with some of the issues in the report and sought clarity on the area of responsibility for the failings.  The Internal Audit Manager said it was not the fault of the software, but was due to incompletion of some of the data within the fields on the system.  He provided responses on actions being taken to address three of the issues, as set out in the report.  In response to a query on the reporting of accurate data for the Clwyd Pension Fund, he advised that some improvement had been made with more work to be made as the issue was still being investigated.  Councillor Halford asked for more detail on this, which the Internal Audit Manager agreed to provide separately.

When asked for his views by Councillor Halford, the Chief Executive repeated his earlier comments that the issues were around record-keeping and not individuals, software or inaccuracy of payments.  He advised that swift progress had been made on the action plan to the satisfaction of all parties, recognising that there was still some work to do.

Councillor Halford asked the Chief Executive to confirm that he was satisfied with the fact that there was incomplete data in the ‘Reporting Manager’ field for 719 employees in March 2015.  The Chief Executive questioned the motives behind these questions and replied that there was assurance from the progress on actions through the Internal Audit work and that he was satisfied with this and explanation of the issues.

Whilst Councillor Ian Roberts agreed with Members’ right to ask questions, he raised concerns that there seemed to be a hidden agenda behind the questioning and pointed out that there were a number of agenda items yet to be considered.

Councillor Glyn Banks congratulated the Internal Audit Manager for the report with ten of the recommendations already implemented, noting that most of the points raised by Councillor Halford were for recommendations where actions were still in progress.  The Chief Executive spoke about the project group which involved Internal Audit and said that the sharing of informal advice would remain part of the work as good practice.

Councillor Arnold Woolley asked if the action target dates were achievable and whether any carried forward would require further update reports to the Committee.  The Internal Audit Manager advised that actions were scheduled for implementation by the required dates, with some already completed early and that progress with tracking recommendations would be reported to the Committee.

Mr. John Herniman of WAO welcomed the rapid progress made on the recommendations which would be reviewed as part of work on the 2015/16 accounts.  He explained the likelihood of identifying some issues raised previously due to the timing of the report.

The Chief Executive confirmed that responses would be sought for the missing field data fields on iTrent by 31 March 2016 and that any outstanding data would be subject to immediate reconciliation work by the respective officers.

RESOLVED:

That the progress made in implementing the actions from the original report be noted.