Minutes:
The quarterly report was presented to the Committee by the Head of Audit and Risk Management (Ms. Woods).
Ms. Woods informed the Committee that 77% of the planned audit work had been completed. She drew members’ attention to the summary of fraud investigations done in-house.
Cllr Bloch mentioned that he had received representations which drew attention to irregularities in the mortuaries service. Ms. Woods alerted members to the whistle-blowing procedure that gave protection to members of staff who wished to bring to light irregularities that they found in the course of their work. Concerned staff could contact her by email on fraudcall@haringey.gov.uk
The Chair proposed that the target for audits completed as a percentage of the planned programme be raised to 95%. It was currently 90%.
The Chair proposed that the target for user satisfaction be raised from 3.5 to 3.75, where 1 signified low satisfaction and 5 signified high satisfaction. Concern was raised that this was a performance indicator that was out of Internal Audit’s control as it reflected the subjective ratings for client satisfaction coming from the client departments. The Head of Internal Audit stated that she thought this was a target that her service should be aiming for, but did suggest that very high ratings were impossible to achieve because a service might rate Internal Audit poorly if they had a lot of recommendations given to them that they were unable to implement to timescale. In such a case, the service provided by Internal Audit would be good; but the client department might be dissatisfied because of their inability to implement the recommendations.
Concern was raised by the Chair as no FRAG-21 certificate had been obtained from ING.
On page 15 of Appendix A of the report, it was mentioned that expenses were not paid through payroll. They were paid through local imprest accounts. The Chair was concerned about this as this had been identified as a weakness.
The Chair alerted Members to the fact that he had sent a letter to all Executive Members and the Chief Executive after the last Audit Committee meeting to ensure that the recommendations of the reports were implemented on time
The Chief Executive ultimately suggested that that the Heads of Service whose services were not complying with recommendations from Internal Audit should be summoned to attend the Audit Committee.
That suggestion of the Chief Executive had been agreed by the Chair and the Director of Finance for implementation henceforth.
The Chair noted that there were a number of outstanding cases where employees were under investigation for alleged irregularities. He wished them to be completed as promptly as possible and in line with proper procedure.
RESOLVED:
1. That the Quarterly Report on Internal Audit be noted.
2. That the Head of Audit and Risk Management through the relevant Executive Members ensure to take all necessary action to expedite outstanding cases. In case of failure, arrangements are to be made to call the respective Head of Service to the Audit Committee to explain the reasons for delay or non-compliance with the recommendations.