Issue - meetings

That the completion of the ICO audit process be noted.

The Democracy & Governance Manager presented the report on the sign-off by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) on its audit of the Council’s compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998 undertaken in April 2013.  The results and agreed action plan had been received by the Committee on 7 October 2013, reporting the conclusion of ‘reasonable assurance’ around the Council’s Data Protection processes and procedures, which was the second best of the four categories of audit opinion.

As part of the ICO follow-up process, a report by Internal Audit detailing progress on the implementation of the action plan had been submitted to the ICO.  This indicated that 61% of the recommendations had been implemented, 26% were in the process of being implemented and 13% had not yet reached their implementation dates.  A response from the ICO stated satisfaction with the progress made.

The Head of Legal & Democratic Services commented on the recently approved new operating model of the Council which reflected the recommendation by ICO for more central awareness and assurance of monitoring of Data Protection procedures.  Following a question from the Chair, he explained that the new chief officer in charge of governance would become the Senior Information Risk Owner (SIRO) for the Council.

The Chair congratulated the Democracy & Governance Manager and officers for their work for their work on this item.

RESOLVED:

That the completion of the ICO audit process be noted.