Apologies for absence were received  from Councillor Capewell, Councillor Galer and Debbie Hanson, EY.

There were no Declarations of Interest declared at the meeting.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 9th December 2024 were confirmed.

There were no matters arising from the above Minutes.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 24th February 2025 were confirmed.

There were no matters arising from the above Minutes.

It was agreed that outstanding audit recommendations would be added to the Work Programme for the October meeting and the relevant officers invited to attend.

The Committee received and considered the report from the Head of Internal Audit.

The Head of Internal Audit reported on the progress made in relation to the delivery of the Annual Audit Plan for 2024/25.

The Head of Internal Audit directed Members to Appendix 1 of the report which showed the progress to date in relation to the implementation of the agreed recommendations. This appendix also reflected the year in which the audit was undertaken and identified between outstanding recommendations that had previously been reported to the Committee and then those that had become outstanding this time round. A total of 64 outstanding recommendations (8 Urgent, 33 Important and 23 Routine) were currently outstanding.  A further 22 recommendations are not yet due, one of which has been cancelled and five are in the final report stage.

Since the Internal Audit Plan was approved, two audits have been cancelled and three have been deferred. Five final reports have been issued, two with substantial assurance and one with reasonable assurance.

Councillor Wainwright queried why audit GY2506 had been deferred as it had been outstanding for some time and asked what work was ongoing with it. Teresa Sharman advised that the recommendations from last time would be implemented. The Monitoring Officer advised that she hoped to recruit someone in a support role and they would need time to settle in hence it being deferred.

RESOLVED:-

That Committee received the progress update relating to the Internal Audit Plan for 2024/25.

Heads of Service entered the Council Chamber to update members on the Outstanding Audit Recommendations for their departments.

Andrea Krout, Democratic Services Officer gave a presentation to Members outlining that there were 41 outstanding audit recommendations: 8 Priority 1, and 33 Priority 2.

The presentation would be in chronological order, starting with the oldest.

James Wilson (Head of Environmental Services) was called to update Members with   regard to recommendation GY 1909 - Contaminated Land. James advised that work on high-risk sites had now been completed and work on medium risk sites would be completed next month. The work is ongoing and will tie in with the new computer system.

Councillor Wainwright thanked JW for the update and asked that the due dates were changed on the system.

James Wilson was then asked to update members on outstanding audit recommendation GY2016 - Corporate Enforcement. James advised that this would be addressed as part of the new IT implementation which is due for completion by the end of the year. In the meantime, an outside company has been appointed to cleanse data and ensure that files are stored correctly. There were no questions from Members.

The next outstanding audit recommendation was GY2208 – Accountancy Services and an update was given by Michael Horton, Head of Property and Asset Management who advised that following on from a data cleanse carried out within Concerto, further issues were identified within the system, (valuation data, rent renewal dates). As a result of this all the information is being migrated from Concerto into a master document and SharePoint. This will allow for P&A to have a master document with the correct data input. P&A will then Initiate training on the Concerto system and control data input. Once the information is accurate, Concerto will be repopulated. The initial collation of data exercise is due to be completed by the 17/04/25.

The Chair asked what the timeline would be and was advised that an initial meeting was due to be held on 10^th April and the first collation would be completed by 17^th April with completion by the end of July. Councillor Wainwright requested that the due date is amended and the Monitoring Officer advised that the audit would still be classed as outstanding.

James Wilson was called to update Members on audit recommendation GY2215 – Environmental Services relating to private water supplies. James advised that all risk assessments have now been completed leaving just ongoing day-to-day monitoring and sampling.

Councillor Carpenter asked whether the testing also included salmonella. James Wilson advised that the private water supplies referred to were non-domestic such as holiday homes or business premises, where the public could be at risk.

James also gave an update on recommendation GY2215 – Anti Social Behaviour. James advised that currently all ASB activity is recorded manually but will be incorporated into the new system which will be in place by the end of the year.

Councillor Newcome asked if all incidents of ASB are recorded and was advised that they are all recorded manually on to a spreadsheet which is then shared with other authorities. The new IT system is being implemented now, area by area and the ASB part will be live by December or hopefully earlier.

The Executive Director- Resources, Karen Sly provided Members with an update for   outstanding audit recommendation GY2207 – Counter Fraud and Corruption Framework. Karen advised that There is no central function for counter fraud with the organisation. When considering resources that are in place to deliver counter fraud activities, this should cover preventative, detecting and actions to address fraudulent activity. The priority is to ensure resources are in place to prevent fraud and this can be met from compliance and internal controls within the service. There are resources in place across services that focus on fraud prevention and compliance. This will include Housing as part of the prevention of RTB and tenancy fraud, Revenues and Benefits for compliance with council tax, business rates and universal credit, in Finance there are system controls within the system and authorisation limits to ensure separation of duties. The Council also take part in the National Fraud Initiative that collates data from the following services:

• Payroll

• Creditors

• Taxi driver licences

• Universal Credit claimants

• Council Tax Reduction Scheme

• Council Tax

• housing tenants

• business rates

• business support grants

• Right to Buy

• housing waiting list

• register of electors

These identify data matches with other LA data which are then investigated. Any fraud investigation work will be externalised if not part of the NFI or cannot be investigated by the internally trained fraud investigation officers.

Karen advised that recommendation 4 is currently being updated and would be taken to the next committee. The approach to fraud prevention and compliance would be made clear in that report.

She also advised that she would be liaising with the Head of Internal Audit as to whether or not Recommendations 3 and 7 were still required. There were no questions from Members.

Nicola Turner, Head of Housing Assets, gave an update on audit recommendation GY2223 – Housing Voids which was outstanding from 2021-22.  Nicola advised that this recommendation could be closed when the new void policy is in place to link with GY2517. She also advised that recommendation 13 has been carried forward. Lots of work has been carried out on the Voids Policy but it is important that costs are understood. It is important to consult on the changes to policy before it is taken to Council for approval to ensure that it covers all the necessary requirements.

Councillor Carpenter asked what the timeframe for this was. Nicola confirmed that the policy had been drafted but needed to be reviewed.

Karen Sly then reported on recommendation GY2202 – Risk Management (Partnership Register). Karen advised that this recommendation was made at a time when the Council was partner in a number of significant partnerships for delivery of services for example GYN and GYBS. These models of delivery have changed with the insourcing and establishment of a wholly owned company for which new governance arrangements were put in place and now form part of the wider internal audit plan. There were no questions from Members.

The Head of Legal and Governance, Caroline Whatling, updated Members with regard to outstanding recommendation GY2302 – Procurement and Contract Management. Caroline reported this historically, this had been a cultural issue and that all officers need to participate in the management of contracts. Regular reminders are sent to officers to ensure contracts are filed in the corporate system. The Project Team have all worked hard to recover contracts and ensure they are held in the strongroom and electronically on the contracts database.

Training was delivered by nplaw and ESC in 23/24 and guidance is published on the Loop. Further training on the Procurement Act 2023 is currently being delivered by ESC, including sessions on the evaluation of tenders under the Act as well as general training on the new requirements.

The Contracts Register review was completed by the Procurement and Contract Management team in late 2023 as part of a one-off project, with lots of content being added– but maintaining compliance (as for any authority) is an ongoing matter and is unlikely to be achieved 100%. Expired contracts have been held on the register to reflect document retention requirements, but these can easily be removed. GYBC does not currently have an inhouse resource for Contract Management, but it is hoped this will be addressed in Q1.

Recent Procurement Policy Notes have been published on The Loop. Any new ones are monitored and published.

The formal process to ensure that budgets are agreed prior to procurement is now referenced in the Constitution at 42.1.3 and 42.4.2 so this is now complete.

Councillor Newcombe commented that paperwork is vital and asked whether it was not done or not filed. The Monitoring Officer advised that as there was no central resource, there was no officer overseeing this. Manager and officers who were responsible for procurement were left to their own devices. Not everything was completed, entered on the register and stored correctly. The culture is in the process of being changed so now everything comes through the Corporate Services system.

Councillor Carpenter commented on the ongoing work and asked if the upcoming vacancy would be permanent and internal or external. Caroline advised that there was no budget for a qualified officer. It would be a permanent position, and the staff member would work closely with and be supervised by East Suffolk Council. It would be a support officer post with the post holder responsible for ensuring that contracts were filed and stored correctly.

The Head of Housing Assets, Nicola Turner, updated Members regarding recommendation GY2316 Tenancy Services. Nicola advised that a new Vulnerability policy has been drafted but before it can be approved and implemented, we need to consult tenants on the policy and review the policy to reflect the consultation responses. In addition to be able to effectively deliver the new Vulnerabilities Policy we need to be able to ensure that vulnerability information on tenants can be captured on our IT systems, so staff know when a tenant has vulnerabilities and what they are. The new NEC Housing system is ensuring we have one record of tenant vulnerabilities which is visible to staff and data can be reviewed and updated. We will also be able to report on the vulnerabilities allowing us to understand the needs of tenants. The timescale for completing this audit had been extended to 31^st May 2025 in order to complete the policy and train staff. There were no questions from Members.

Miranda Lee, Head of Customer Services updated Members on audit recommendation GY2405 Accounts Receivable and Income. The completion date for this audit recommendation has been agreed to change to 30/06/25. This is because Members of Scrutiny Committee have requested a ‘Review of Council Tax Debt Collection Practices and wording of Council Tax debt letters.’ A report will be presented to Scrutiny Committee on the 20th April 2025. This delay will enable Officers to consider Members feedback in relation to the Councils current debt collection practices before finalising the updates to the Corporate Debt Management Recovery Policy. There were no questions from Members.

Sam Hubbard, Head of Planning was then asked to update Members on outstanding audit recommendation GY2408 Development Management (Planning Enforcement). Sam advised that reporting on activity is currently difficult due to the current IT system. A new IT system is currently being implemented by the end of December 2025. It would not be appropriate to set-up new reporting processes and systems until new system is implemented to avoid abortive work. There is currently a lack of capacity within the team to review and update the Planning Enforcement Policy. A revised date of August 2025 has now been set.

With regard to recommendation GY2311 (Planning), Sam advised Members that reporting on an activity is currently difficult due to the current system, Ocella, which is not good at running reports. The new system, which is due to completed by the end of the year will allow for quarterly reporting of key performance statistics. There were no questions from Members.

Nicola Turner updated Members on recommendation GY2402 Key Controls and Assurance which related to former tenant arrears. The timescale for completing this audit recommendation has been extended to 31 July 2025. This extension reflects the fact that a new integrated housing assets and management system (NEC Housing) is currently in implementation. The implementation of the rents functionality was due to go live in February 2024 but was delayed until June 2024 when the system went live but experienced issues until October 2024 leading to an increase in arrears.

The priority of the Housing Income Team has therefore had to be on current rent accounts and supporting tenants to manage and reduce arrears. Former tenant work has been held. An additional Income Officer is being recruited which will provide capacity to review former tenant arrears and ensure that any debt write offs are actioned and moving forward to ensure timely action is taken to write off debt when it is appropriate to do so as it is clear the debt cannot be recovered.

Councillor Wainwright asked whether the new system was on track and was advised that the rent functionality is completely working. One area needed to be checked before the start of the new financial year, but this is now working correctly.

Councillor Lawn asked who was responsible for the decision to write off outstanding rents. Nicola advised that if the location of the ex-tenant is known, then they will always take action to collect outstanding debts but if the location is not known then it the decision to write off the debt is made by a manager. Councillor Newcome asked if the Council had access to other means of tracing people. Nicola advised that the Council takes part in the National Fraud Initiative to track debtors. Councillor Newcome queried whether the costs in time outweigh the debt. The Executive Director – Resources that the data is shared with other authorities. Nicola further commentated that it was a good policy that worked well with the recovery agents.

The Head of Legal and Governance updated Members regarding recommendation GY2402 Key Controls and Assurance regarding hyperlinks in the Annual Governance Statement. She suggested that it was not practical to have hyperlinks in a document, as they are very easily broken or go out of date. She advised that the document was available on the website and that she would discuss this with the Internal Auditors .

Michael Horton, Head of Property and Asset Management was asked to update Members on recommendation GY2411. Michael advised that rent reviews are being carried out as per the auditors’ requirements. Previously, surveyors were given individual portfolios, but this was now being collated into a single document in order to improve the management of the process. Councillor Wainwright commented that it was good to see this was happening.

Michael also advised that reconciliation of data within Concerto and finance is due to be completed on the 17/04/2025. We have a master user of Concerto who is now trained and when the data has been cleaned, and input is completed by P&A, dashboards will be made available for other departments. A full update of Concerto will be completed by end July 2025.

With regard to the rent proving procedure, the process for this is to be defined on 10/04/2025, with both finance and sundry debts input. The process will be agreed on how and what data will be provided and what responses are required to ensure that rents are paid and are due. The finalised process will follow on 15/05/2025.

Due to restructure and internal changes, the rolling programme for Stock Control Surveys has not progressed beyond prioritisation of sites; we have a priority list of sites defined by P&A with a requirement for soft market testing to take place for GYBC to understand costings. Soft market testing is due by the end of May 2025. This will be subject to approval from ELT and a programme of improvements including costings will follow. However, the team is now fully staffed and there is now a full programme for the next 10 years, which will feed into the disposal/acquisitions programme.

Councillor Wainwright asked if the Council were able to get into a property to do a survey if that property was let on a full repairing lease and was advised that historically, that had not been the case. Councillor Wainwright asked if we would give the tenant a certain amount of time to put it right. Michael advised that it would depend on the lease type. In some cases, it is possible to monitor the situation; in other cases, the tenant may decide to terminate the lease depending on costs.

Councillor Newcombe referred to the lease for the rugby club as being very basic and asked if the Council was confident that the leases were robust. Michael advised that the department had a good relationship with NPLaw and was confident that the rent reviews and leases were now robust.

Michael also advised that following a review of resilience, a restructure of the department had taken place. There are two parts of the team: the Facilities Management/ Maintenance side, which is fully staffed, and the tenancy side which currently has two vacant roles that are proving difficult to appoint to. Consideration to change the original restructure proposal will be taken to ELT in April 2025.

Michael confirmed to Members that the Acquisitions and Disposals policy is up to date and adhered to in any and all disposals and acquisitions.

The Monitoring Officer updated Members on audit recommendation GY2505 – Contract Management. Caroline advised that Ken Coles (EELGA) has prepared an updated template and guidance on risk assessment, and this is now available on The Loop (intranet) for officers to access.

The Monitoring Officer informed Members that guidance on contract extensions and variations is being drafted by nplaw and is to be published on the Loop. Updating of the contracts register will be largely dependent on recruitment to the Procurement & Contract Management Support Officer post, due Q1 of 25/26. It is currently handled by Democratic Services officers, which is not an appropriate long-term solution.

Caroline also apprised Members that contract performance review meetings were not being held as widely as they should be, and this would be addressed via contract management training which would take place in 2025. This training would also cover contract risk assessment for each contract, as well as Contract management arrangements which would be set out explicitly in contracts by inclusion of Schedule 4.

The Head of Organisational development, Sarah Tate updated Members on recommendation GY2512 – Sickness Management. Sarah advised Members that the target of holding sickness absence review meetings within 14 days of the employee’s return to work is monitored on an ongoing basis. The Q2 and Q3 sickness report was  sent to Auditors 07/02/2025 showing monitoring of this target is happening on a quarterly basis as per the agreed audit recommendations. Sarah acknowledged that there is more work to do to ensure that these are carried out in a timely manner and requested to amend the end date to 30 June 2025 to allow Q4 monitoring and reporting to be completed and a review of the target to be undertaken.

Councillor Carpenter asked what criteria there were for following up sickness in support of the staff member. Sarah advised that key indicators were used such as supportive action, early intervention as well as a broad spectrum of support.

The Property Operations Manager, Andy Elvin updated Members on behalf of Scott Luxton, Head of Repairs and Maintenance regarding the stores contract with Jewson. Andy advised that both aspects of the recommendation had been signed off on 19^th March 2025. Jewsons had been bought out which had led to the delay.  Ongoing performance meetings regarding correct recording of Jewson’s advice notes are in place, and this is now a standing agenda item to ensure this information is being captured. Despite numerous emails and calls to PfH, management reports, as stipulated in Schedule 4 of the PfH contract were finally provided on 17/03/25. A re-tender process for this contract is being considered and initial meetings with East Suffolk’s procurement team have taken place to see if this is a direction to explore.

Addressing Members, the Monitoring Officer commented that work is clearly being done on the outstanding audit recommendations, and many can either be closed or are irrelevant and can be closed off the official record.

Natalie Gourley, Senior Internal Auditor, advised that the number of outstanding audit recommendations should start to go down but that officers would still need to liaise with TIAA or BDO.

The Executive Director – Resources commented that having the officers attend, provided context and showed that work is happening on the recommendations and that in many cases, there were reasons why delays had occurred.

Councillor Newcombe concurred that it was good to that the Heads of Service had attended the meeting and that it was important to see the whole picture.

Councillor Wainwright also agreed that it had been a really useful exercise and that it was important to get the number of outstanding audit recommendations down and to have new dates added to create an accurate picture.

Councillor Carpenter also agreed and stated that it would be good to get the officers to reattend at a future meeting.

The Committee received and considered the report from the Head of Internal Audit, Teresa Sharman.

A new planning approach was adopted this year as outlined in the report and an audit and risk universe established. The Plan is flexible and will be subject to quarterly reviews to meet the changing needs of the Council as necessary.

An Internal Audit Plan 2025/26 has been established with senior management and is shown within the report. A new Charter and Mandate has been written following changes in internal auditing standards to include the Mandate (authority) for Internal Audit, following the template for the Public Sector, available through the professional body for internal audit.

The principles of the Charter, which set outs the purpose, independence, organisational position and reporting relationships of Internal Audit, Audit Committee’s oversight, and the roles and responsibilities of the Head of Internal Audit, are similar to the previous version in its content, with the Mandate being the addition to the document.

RESOLVED:-

That Committee: review and approve the Internal Audit Plan 2025/26 and Internal Audit Charter and Mandate.

The Committee received and considered the report from the Monitoring Officer who advised that Great Yarmouth Borough Council were one of the last in Norfolk not to have appointed an Independent Person and that to do so would make the Council more robust. A Position Statement was issued by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) in 2022 which contained a number of recommendations including that local authorities include at least two co-opted independent Members on their audit committees. This is not presently a statutory requirement, but it is anticipated that it may become a requirement in the future.

The Monitoring Officer advised that although the recommendation was to appoint two Independent Persons, one would be a good starting point. They would not have voting rights but would be able to take part in any debates.

The Chair, Councillor Carpenter, stated that he thoroughly recommended Committee agreed to this and that the cost of £600 a year was not excessive.

Councillor Wainwright commented that it was a good move forward and hoped that the interview process would be rigorous.

The Monitoring Officer advised that other authorities had shared their application forms with her which have sections relating to affiliation which should rule out any potential conflicts of interest.

Councillor Wainwright commented that as the Audit, Risk and Standards |committee does not make decisions, that would work well and queried when the appointment of an Independent Person would take effect.

The Monitoring Officer advised that the proposal would go to Council in April and an advert had already been prepared.

RESOLVED:-

That Committee RECOMMEND COUNCIL to:

1) (subject to budgetary approval) appoint 1 independent Member to Audit, Risk & Standards Committee for a 3-year period or until such time as Local Government Reorganisation takes place; and

2) give delegated authority to the Monitoring Officer, in consultation with the Chair of Audit, Risk & Standards Committee, to undertake recruitment arrangements.

3) adjust Committee’s Terms of Reference to require it to report annually on how the Committee has complied with the CIPFA Position Statement, to include:

- how it has discharged its responsibilities

- an assessment of its performance

and that such report be made available to the public.

The Chairman reported that there was no other business being of sufficient urgency to warrant consideration at the meeting.