Agenda item

To consider a report which provides the Audit Committee with a high-level progress report on the work of the Internal Audit and Counter Fraud team for Q2 of the 2023/24 financial year.

The Committee received and discussed a report submitted by the Head of Audit and Counter Fraud which provides Members with a high-level progress report on the work of the Internal Audit and Counter Fraud team for Q2 of the 2023/24 financial year which alongside:

 • further progress reports on Q3 and Q4 for 2023/24 to be provided to the Committee during the year;

• the Head of Audit and Counter Fraud’s Annual Report and Opinion for the year 2023/24; and,

 • joint reports to the Audit Committee on Actions to address agreed service areas;

assists the Committee in discharging it’s responsibilities as set out in the Audit Committee’s Terms of Reference, which form part of the Council’s Constitution.

The report summarises the work carried out by the team from 1 April 2023 to 30 September 2023. During the first half of the year the team prioritised the Council’s Fundamental Financial Systems (FFS) reviews to provide assurance in respect of the 2022/23 Financial Statements, and the Annual Opinion Report of the Head of Audit and Counter Fraud for 2022/23.

In addition, other Audit and Counter Fraud Team activity included:

• Continued support in respect of COVID-19 grant funding regimes, including responding to Central Government requests for supporting information in respect of grants received.

• Completion of a variety of other planned Audit reviews and reports on St Theresa’s Primary School, St. Joseph’s Primary School and Licensing Income.

• Ongoing work on audit reviews of Street Lighting, Energy Management, Land Sales, the Contract Register, Spindles Procurement, the Music Service and Burnley Brow Primary School, and the Council’s Music Service.

• Corporate Counter Fraud activities have identified £123,626 of fraud, errors and overpayments. The Direct Payments Audit Team (Children and Adults) have continued to deliver significant recovery outcomes which have generated £31,289 and £1,343,777 (respectively) for the period 1 April 2023 to 30 September 2023.

In response to Cllr Hamdani’s query about why the accounts receivable report had been split into 2 reports, the Committee was informed that the Draft Accounts Receivable report has, at final stage, been split into two separate reports and re-issued. The first report, of the same name, now covers only the day-to-day Accounts Receivable functions, and now has an opinion of Adequate. A second report in respect of the Council’s Debt Recovery processes has been issued in order focus management attention on this area. The Debt Recovery process was the reason for the original Draft Opinion on Accounts Receivable being Inadequate. This opinion now transfers to the new Debt Recovery report where the audit opinion is Inadequate.

In response to a query, the Head of Audit reminded Members that they will receive reports on management actions to address recommendations arising on both the Direct Payments and Payroll FFS reports in January.

The Committee discussed a way forward whereby medium and high risk actions coming out of individual audits could be reported as a condensed view which shows management actions against timeframe indicators.The Head of Audit agreed to look at how this might best be reported to the committee.

Resolved – that  2023-24 Q2 Audit and Counter Fraud Progress report be noted.