Audit and Governance Committee - Thursday 21 November 2024, 4:00pm - Cotswold District Council Webcasting

Audit and Governance Committee
Thursday, 21st November 2024 at 4:00pm 

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  1. Councillor Nigel Robbins
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  1. Christopher Bass
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  7. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  8. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
  9. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  10. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
  11. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  12. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
  13. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  14. Christopher Bass
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  17. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
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  19. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
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  26. John Chesshire
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  30. John Chesshire
  31. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  32. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
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  35. Councillor Len Wilkins
  36. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  37. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
  38. Councillor Nigel Robbins
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  40. Angela Claridge
  41. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
  42. Councillor Nigel Robbins
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  44. Councillor Patrick Coleman
  45. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  46. Officer
  47. Councillor Nigel Robbins
  48. Angela Claridge
  49. Ana Prelici, Officer
  50. Ana Prelici, Officer
  51. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
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  1. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
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  6. Councillor Michael Vann
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  8. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
  9. Councillor Michael Vann
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  11. Councillor Jeremy Theyer
  12. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
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  7. David Stanley, Deputy CEO
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  1. Councillor Michael Vann
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  3. Councillor Mike Evemy
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  5. Webcast Finished

1 Apologies

Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:00:00
Cotswold District Council. Welcome everybody. My first announcement is to thank and record
our recognition to Anna, for whom this is her last meeting at Cotswold District Council.
She's given very good and efficient service and we're very sorry to see her go to Whitney,
but I suppose if that doesn't work out we can always cater space for her to come back,
can't we?
Do we have any apologies?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:00:35
We received apologies from Councillor Helen Mensor.

2 Substitute Members

Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:00:46
Do we have any substitute members?
No.
It doesn't look like it.
But we are core it, I'm assured.

3 Declarations of Interest

Are there any declarations of interest? Let's have a look at the minutes of the previous

4 Minutes

meeting which was on the 24th of October. Are there any points of inaccuracy on page
Six.
Christopher Bath.
Chris.
Just one very minor thing.
It was actually myself and not John Cheshire
that was present at that meeting.
Yes, I think.
And it was apologies from me.
So if you could correct that, please.
I couldn't imagine how you could be confused.
Anyway.
And on page 7, if we look at the third line from the end on page 7, it says, the clause
says, but that if a complaint was handled in a way that the complainant was satisfied,
surely it was not satisfied with, the claimant could complain to the ombudsman.
Is that not right?
We have missed a lot.
Yes, OK.
OK, I don't mind.
Yes, I think that's what it really should have meant.
Councillor Thayer, good.
Welcome.
Page 8.
I am having to get used to these pronouns.
The theys instead of the he's and she's.
And page 9, are we happy with that?
Thanks very much.
Yes.
Sorry, just one other minor thing.
I could go back to page 6.
Just where we talked about the no P .O. no payment process.
Yes.
I think we had a commitment minimally to scope that, which I don't think is noted in the
minutes.
Yes, I believe we did, didn't we?
Is that your number, David?
We did.
Yes.
Thank you very much.
Well spotted.
That should be under 293, shouldn't it?
Yes.
I wasn't at the last meeting.
Could you clarify this important correction?
Christopher Bass - 0:03:45
So, it was noted in the audit report
the number of invoices that were being paid
that didn't have an associated purchase order.
And we had some discussions around the merits
of a no purchase order, no payment process.
So, I think David kindly talked us through that,
said it is quite lengthy to scope and implement,
which is noted in here, but what it doesn't go so far as to say is that the
scoping for that will will begin because I think everybody was agreed that that
would be a good improvement to the compliance and controls.
Thank you.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:04:19
Then could we raise our hands to support the minutes given those additions and
corrections.
Members can vote, can't they?
On the minutes?
No.
What a shame.
Always like to add your weight to our decisions.
They can add weight, just not vote.
Okay, so that...
Yes, thank you.
OK.
Are there any public questions or member questions?

5 Public Questions

6 Member Questions

7 Strategic Risk Register

In which case, let's move on to item seven, the strategic risk
register.
I must apologize for the size of the typescript here.
This is where it really is better
Let's look at things on a tablet or computer and enlarge it if you can.
I don't know, David, would you like to take us through this and perhaps indicate where
there have been additions?
Officer - 0:06:24
Okay, we're on, I think.
Yeah, apologies.
Let's see, it's very, very small in the pack.
Even printed off, actually, it's a little bit small.
So this is the latest risk register that goes
through the council's exec.
So in terms of updates, any updates in terms
of the risk are shown in red.
And then the arrow to the right is where we're showing a change
in direction of travel from the last report.
So in terms of where we've got a direction of travel,
we've got CDC IR8, and that's staff resources.
And we just increased that to reflect while we're going
through this period of change, and we've got quite a few
vacancies that we're out to recruitment at the moment.
So those interviews are scheduled so hopefully once
appointment is made we can reduce that risk.
That's relating to sort of director roles, roles that
we've got vacant in planning and comms.
So that's just to reflect the current situation.
And then we have reduced the risk in relation to cyber attack.
And actually it's not a reduction.
What you wouldn't have seen, we increased the risk in response
when Cheatsbury had a cyber attack.
So just to be sort of on high alert
while that process was going on, the risk was increased.
It's now decreased to the level that it was before.
So it's just showing that it is a dynamic process
in terms of how we manage the risks.
And then finally, the other change,
whilst it's not a change of direction of travel,
just on the last page and the last risk on the risk register
is a new risk that's been added.
And this is around sort of delivery of CDC program
of major projects.
And it's around sort of, this is the right one, yeah.
Actually, that's not showing, is it?
We've got a new risk and it doesn't look like it's printed
out on there.
So we've got a new risk around externally funded projects.
And this is around conditions that apply when we've got an
externally funded project.
So we might have finances that are attached to it,
but it may have conditions around when that project needs
to be delivered, which potentially if we don't deliver
it at a certain time, it may risk the finances.
So we've just added a risk on, but I don't think it's actually
showing in the version that I've got.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:08:38
And what number or what number is that risk?
Officer - 0:08:41
It should be CDC NPR 2.
It is on the live version, is it?
Okay, perfect.
So, yeah, so that's a new risk that we've added recently,
but any other risks where we've changed them are shown in red.
So I'll just take any questions or if you've got any comment.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:09:00
Thank you, Cheryl.
I suppose transition, the impact of transition,
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:09:08
transfer, the new arrangements.
Officer - 0:09:13
I mean, that's reflected sort of within the resources
one where we've put that up, which is a fallout of the transition, but we haven't increased
the risk at the moment in terms of transition because it's successfully transferred over
on the 1st of November, so therefore the risk is quite stable at the moment, it's just the
fallout of that, and one of those is where we've got gaps in structure which was reflected
in the resource risk.
Thank you.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:09:41
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:09:45
Hi. Sorry. Just I'm having to magnify it with my phone, even my glasses. Too much sheep
scanning has ruined them, the old labels. CDC PR2, we've got a red line on there which
is basically going back to that freedom leisure.
Is that the, I just, why is it gone from red?
And then it sort of, as you read on, it sort of says it's, you know,
the council and public air continue to monitor and manage
that leisure contract.
Because of the changeover, are we making sure that we are really
monitoring it because we've got a lot of factions going on, we've got public
moving, we've got ourselves trying to grab the reins on that.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:10:43
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 0:10:45
Thank you chair, just in terms of the contract monitoring and discussions of
Freedom of the Ledger, we do have quarterly meetings, we had a quarterly meeting at the
start of this week that's attended by a number of officers including myself,
Stuart Wilson who works currently for Publica, sort of overseeing the contract, but was also
attended by Councillor Paul Hodgkinson who has the cabinet responsibility for that area.
And that goes through the general performance in terms of number of visitors to the museum,
number of active subscribers to Freedom Leisure Centres, but also goes through issues that
have been raised either in custom complaints or indeed occasionally customer compliments
and we do have a thorough discussion particularly about some of those issues and how the resolution
would work through.
So they're currently quarterly when the contract was led to freedom, we have them as monthly,
and we do reserve, I suppose, the right to escalate those back to monthly if performance
starts dropping off.
Thank you for that, David.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:11:54
There's no automatic reason is there why our contract with Freedom of Leisure
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 0:12:05
should be significantly changed during this process? No but I think with any
period of change where you've got staff transferring between publica where it's
been a shared resource and councils looking to either make their service
more sovereign or sharing there is that risk that individuals who have been
heavily involved in contract management may not end up supporting Cotswold
District Council so that there is a risk I think it's covered to an extent within
the public review risk in terms of that have we got the right staffing resources
to discharge the responsibilities that we've got around contract management and
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:12:49
service provision. Thank you. Are there any other comments or questions? Chris
Please.
Okay, yeah.
Christopher Bass - 0:12:54
A question on another one of my favorite topics,
health and safety, always catches my eye.
So if I look at that one, which was CDC IR3,
there hasn't been any update to the commentary.
It's been, the risk is mitigated with a residual
score down to an amber rating.
I was just wondering, I mean, that's a concern to
me that it's only mitigated down to an amber rating.
So just wondering if there are other opportunities to ensure
compliance with the Health and Safety at Work Act.
Cheryl?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:13:29
Officer - 0:13:31
So we have things like we have a health and safety board in
place.
We also take health and safety stats to the public board and
they're done on a quarterly basis.
There's a lot of mitigations that are going on at the moment.
So we have seen a little increase in terms of sort of
bad backs and stuff from sort of your set up
and your DSC assessment.
So there's work ongoing at the moment to look at
potentially replacement program for things like
chairs and things like that.
So there's lots of mitigation going on.
In terms of the sort of the council as a whole,
we're not doing a lot of frontline services with us.
It's a lot of desk -based services.
So the actual volume of accidents that we get are
very, very minimal.
It's like a cut finger.
We're seeing an increase in things like aggressive
behavior towards the customer services team.
And that's, again, another thing that we're looking
at in terms of training.
So customer services training, how to sort of
deal with volatile and, you know, difficult customers.
So again, there's a lot of focus on that.
And we're actually doing all the health and safety
managers looking at doing some face -to -face training
with staff who are front -facing to make sure
we're mitigating that because we have seen a spike.
So it is an ongoing thing that we are looking at
constant mitigations around health and safety.
Christopher Bass - 0:14:48
No, that's helpful. A follow up if I may, just to understand the way the report works.
So, none of the risks that we're looking at here have a green rating.
Could you get a green rating or if it goes green is it effectively not a risk anymore?
Is a green saying zero risk?
Yeah, a green would be saying there's nothing more for us to do whereas health and safety is an ongoing process isn't it in terms of mitigation.
So we always keep it flagged a little bit higher.
Yeah, in that case it makes perfect sense because you can never get to zero risk on health and safety.
Okay, thank you.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:15:16
Thank you for that. David, you have a comment. Thank you, Chair. Just
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 0:15:20
in terms of the health
and safety process that we go through, there's a quarterly meeting called the
Local Health and Safety Committee that met on the 5th of November. That's
attended by myself and Rob Weaver is the chief executive. So usually the key
statutory officers from each council attend that. That runs through the health
and safety performance, it does cover off the types of information that Cheryl has
set out, but we are looking at how health and safety in terms of the council's
responsibilities and employer changes, but also as changes to service provision
come through for those frontline services, how we deal with that, but that's
certainly something that's very high on our list of must attend meetings every quarter, so
get that good oversight of what's going on and follow that through.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:16:14
Cheryl raised the point about aggressive customers, which we're going to be dealing with under
the next item, of course.

8 Customer Complaints Policy and Procedure

Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:16:39
I beg your pardon.
Customer complaints and procedure.
That's the next item.
You actually have three papers here.
The first one is the policy and procedure,
but you've also got something we haven't seen before,
it's a staff personal safety policy in case of unreasonable
behaviour, the various categories there,
which we might not have imagined would happen,
but they do happen, I guess.
and inequalities and rurality.
That was the thing that surprised me.
You'll have to explain that in a moment.
But I go to hand over to you, Cheryl,
to go through and explain for the member,
particularly for the member responsible for complaints,
which happens to be me as chair of the Audit and Governance
Committee, a responsibility I haven't quite understood,
I think, before I took this post up.
I'm going to hand over to you.
Thank you, Chair.
Officer - 0:17:44
So as you say, this report brings two policies.
One is a new policy, which is a customer complaints policy
and procedure, and then the staff personal safety policy.
But actually we are going to rename this
to unreasonable behaviour policy.
This is actually a policy that we have got in place,
but this just makes it a little bit more robust
and we're putting some more sort of procedures around it.
This one's more to note because we have got that in place
and it's an update, whereas the complaints policy
is a new policy.
So, with regards to the complaints policy,
so this is fallen out from the local government
of social care Ombudsman,
who following a lengthy consultation process
finalised their new complaint handling code in February 24.
And so the purpose of the code is basically
to enable organisations to resolve complaints,
but to have better complaint monitoring,
have better responses and to learn from the complaints that we get.
So whilst they haven't made it a mandatory code they are encouraging
councils to adopt the code and they want councils to do it by no later than April
2026 which is when they will start using that code but what we want to do is try
and bed that in now. But whilst they're saying it's not mandatory they would be
questioning if a council doesn't comply with this code so in theory it is
mandatory. We are looking to implement it from the 1st of April. One of the main changes
is we are going from a three -stage process down to a two -stage process. Currently our
complaint process has three internal stages to it. The first one is the service area response.
If the complaint is about, and I use example, Revs and Bens, then we would expect it will
be the Revs and Bens service manager who would look at that complaint and respond accordingly.
The second stage is an independent review by complaints team and they would look at,
it's not re -looking or redoing the complaint, it's basically assessing whether we feel that
the service has responded effectively to that complaint and it may be responding to some
additional bits if the customer has raised anything that's part of their stage 2.
And then we have the final decision at stage 3.
This new process takes it down to a two -stage, so we'd have the service area response and
and then we would have the final decision before the complainer
can then go to the Ombudsman if they remain dissatisfied.
In terms of whether this changes much,
I have only ever seen one complaint
where we have actually changed the response at a final appeal.
So I don't think the customer isn't losing anything
and actually they can escalate their complaint quicker
if they remain dissatisfied up to the Ombudsman
through this process.
The other key things around it is around accountability.
So what the Ombudsman has asked for is, so we say,
Chair, that we have a member who is responsible for complaints.
And that's basically receiving, you know, an annual report
in terms of complaints, what the council has done
about those complaints, what we've learned about them.
And then we have, we're saying
that we've got sufficient resources
for handling those complaints.
And when they have somebody, a complaint officer,
who's responsible, as well as a senior complaint executive
who we've put down as head of paid services.
So the policy is pretty self -explanatory,
sort of goes through how we define a complaint,
what would be a complaint, what would be a service request,
so differentiating between that,
and then set time scales as to how we'd respond,
what we have to respond to, and also accessibility,
so making sure that the customer can complain
through various forms,
and we're not restricting access to that.
Going hand in hand with that is what I'm going to call
the unreasonable behavior policy.
So we say this is a sort of a revised version.
We currently have a spreadsheet or a process for recording
where we've got sort of somebody who's done
the fixation complaints.
You know, they're not allowed to do certain things.
So we have that process in place, but it's not very tight
at the moment.
So this just tightens it all up.
It makes sure we're going to do sort of more comms around
that this process exists.
You know, making sure that staff are aware that if they are going
out to meet a customer or going to a customer's home,
that they are checking this.
So it's all around sort of improving that safety
and making sure that we've got those processes in place.
So I will just take questions.
Thank you, Cheryl.
I'm sure there will be questions.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:22:14
I mean, I have a question anyway.
That is who decides and applying what criteria to go
from stage 1 to the stage 2 review
and how independent is that review?
Officer - 0:22:29
Is that in the complaint?
Yes, so it is the customer's decision.
When we have a stage 1 complaint,
we respond to them by the service area.
They receive their complaint response.
If they remain dissatisfied, it is then up to the customer
to say, I want to escalate it to a stage 2,
or they may feel that the response
that we have given, they are satisfied with it
and that's the end of the complaint.
So it's not us who makes that decision,
it's the customer who makes the decision
as to whether they want to escalate.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:23:01
How do you make it independent?
Independent as in our response?
Yes.
Officer - 0:23:06
Oh, okay. So the service,
so the first one is not independent
because it's a service area response.
The second one comes to complaints team.
So we've got myself and two, well, 1 .5 staff
who then look at the complaint.
They will look into the complaint, look into the responses, they may do some interrogation,
say if it was a housing complaint, they may go and look at the trail in terms of that
housing response and then they will be looking to see whether they deem the response that
has been done by the service area to be satisfactory or whether it needs further response.
Fine, yes, I understand that.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:23:45
So you are the objective, or at least you aspire to be the objective team to judge whether
the complaint has been satisfactory dealt with.
That raises further questions.
Thank you, Chad.
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:23:58
I do think it would be helpful if we looked at this section by section because they are
quite different, even though they are quite fairly on the same agenda.
The one thing I feel is maybe in common, and this is an opening comment and maybe a suggestion,
is that both of these could perhaps benefit from being pretty thoroughly briefed to our
fellow members of the Council.
Councillors are mentioned as a group in both.
And it is important that we are up to date, all of us, not just the few of us on this
committee.
So I think that might be both of these sections would be in my view suitable candidates for
member training sessions, which I think are fairly structurally timetable these days.
The first thing I want to look at in particular, I think, is 5 .1, where it says that under
the complaints policy, it does not include, there are certain matters we cannot usually
consider including complaints about the conduct of elected members which is that
bits highlighted which suggests that if you are reading this on the machine you
can click on to know and find out how to complain about elected members and
perhaps since some people perhaps many of the people are interested in this and
they're going to be complaining aren't particularly high -tech I don't know
whether we could add a summary of what that alternative route is in other words
saying elected members, it makes about the conduct of elected members, this is covered
by another policy somewhere else or wherever.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:25:50
Shall we just deal with that first of all? I mean I think that's a very fair point. Why
should a member of the public have to choose more than one route to complain about something
or other, whether it's an issue or a person or their treatment? And why should that exclude
members, I can quite understand that the code of conduct comes in at that point, which is
somewhat separate from this. We are not necessarily imposing a code of conduct on members of the
public. But I don't know whether you have a view on that, Cheryl?
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:26:26
So at the moment that would link through to the complaints page on the website for if you were raising a member complaint.
So a member complaint I'm sure I'm gonna have to...
And you're looking at me when I'm saying the right thing here.
So it falls under the council constitution and any complaints regarding members would go to Angela as the monitoring officer, not through to the complaints team.
but what happens sometimes if we get a complaint
come through about a member, we would then just send it
on to the monitoring officer to manage.
But again, we can always include something within the policy,
but this would sit on the website
and then the link is then through
to the relevant information on the website.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:27:10
So that is fine if they apply online,
they can see which way to follow through.
and in the case of a spoken complaint,
then who would transfer that spoken complaint to you,
where obviously you know which way to then route it,
whether it is a member or not?
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:27:38
Again, it depends how it comes in.
If it was coming through customer services,
they would normally take the spoken complaint,
they put it into an email and they send it through to the complaints team and
then we'd handle it from there as to what direction it would go.
Councillor Coleman.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:27:55
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:27:56
Just one minor point on page 28 near the top where they've got the
following channels with six blobs. It says underneath that individuals may
have a suitable representative deal with their complaint.
I'm just a little concerned as to who
is going to judge whether they're suitable or not.
Presumably just the individual.
I wonder if that should be, may have a representative
of their choice.
Because if it's suitable to the complainant,
then it's suitable.
I don't think we can judge that you've got the wrong person
representing you.
And I imagine possibly occasionally a counselor
might be a suitable representative.
But it raises a question of how do you decide who is suitable?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:28:48
It is by process of exclusion.
In other words, if they are already on the PSR register, they would not be allowed to represent somebody who is making a complaint.
I hope that would never be a member.
You have brilliantly brought the two parts together, haven't you?
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:29:03
Thank you, Chair.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:29:08
Anything further to be said on that?
Probably not.
We'd probably just check that the person's able to act on their behalf, you know, if they had somebody who was representing them, but yeah, nothing more to be said.
There's absolutely no way of vetting them at all, is there really? To be honest, they could be, you know, just a neighbour, relative, friend.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:29:29
Just on page 31, number 8, outcomes and remedies.
We've got a list there, apologies, acknowledging where things have gone wrong, providing explanations,
taking action, recognizing.
Second from bottom, it says providing a financial remedy.
Do you feel that that's sort of opening the floodgates and saying, come and complain,
we're giving you financial remedy?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:29:57
Well, a modest financial remedy was supplied recently, as was reported at the last audit
and governance meeting where somebody, so I don't know, David's in charge of the money.
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 0:30:14
It would have to be proportionate to the complaint that's been made and any inconvenience the
resident has incurred as a result.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:30:28
And again.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:30:29
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:30:30
So I'm still like, do we actually need that wording in there? Are we opening ourselves
up for more complaints? I'm just, I'm just tight. Personally, I don't want to give money
away. I'm a farmer, I can't help it. It's just a brain ache. So it just comes out in
life.
I mean, how public are these?
Yeah, I mean the list has been taken from the Ombudsman,
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:30:55
Officer - 0:30:55
so that's what they've said is remedy.
However, what it is, if, yeah, it is, so we,
it's very rarely that we give out any financial remedy.
It may be, you know, that actually, it may be sometimes,
you know, Revs and Bends, we don't charge for a court order
or something like that, or, you know,
somebody has incurred costs because they've had
to post something in, so it's minimal.
What we tend to do actually is we will apologize and if they then escalate to the Ombudsman the Ombudsman would all
Normally come back with saying you need to pay 50 pound or you know
So it's very rarely that we give any financial remedy, but we have to say that it is something that we sometimes offer
or provide
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:31:38
Yes, we certainly wouldn't pay for hurt feelings would we I mean, you know
If you go through the courts, you can get huge damages for things like that
We are not talking about that sort of thing.
John?
Thank you, Chair.
John Chesshire - 0:31:52
A quick question.
Again, we can kind of come up with hypothetical situations.
Let's say we get to a serious complaint and you are asked to investigate it.
The serious complaint is about a senior manager.
You do the work on the complaint.
But how does the, what's the approval process for the end of your work?
Officer - 0:32:16
Looking at that scenario, that would probably fall outside of the complaints process.
It would probably go to HR.
If we're investigating an individual or a manager, it would probably go through a formal investigation but under an HR procedure.
Whereas this would be complaints relating to service.
So, anything relating to, you know, maybe if it was a service
complaint and somebody had gone out and, you know,
shouted at a customer.
So, if we found that that was proven and we felt that,
you know, that that person had done something wrong,
but we would, that would then move out of our control to then
go to HR, so move out of complaints into a formal
HR process.
John Chesshire - 0:32:54
But, thank you for the clarification.
It's my misunderstanding.
When you get to the end of the investigation,
Is it within your gift to say that's concluded, there is no sort of back and forth with the area?
Officer - 0:33:09
We'll always be working with the area because we need to get information, insight, so we take their response,
we take the complainant, the original complaint, what their response was, we may go back into the area to look for the evidence, etc.
back and forth, we may ask opinion of somebody who is independent, then we would formulate
our response and we would make the decision as to whether we upheld it or not, and then
it would then be up to the customer to say no, I'm still not satisfied, and they would
go to the Ombudsman who would then look at our response and come back with the final decision.
John Chesshire - 0:33:43
Thank you very much indeed.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:33:47
Thank you.
Thank you, chair.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:33:50
Sorry, I didn't, apologies for being late.
I didn't realize that the area was surrounded by traffic problems.
But anyway, the question is, supposing somebody decides they'd like to use a representative
who says, I'll do it, but I want a fee.
Secondly, supposing they include, they incur cost in making that complaint.
What happens to those?
Do we pay these costs?
I can't find any reference to cost.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:34:18
I see at least one head being shaken.
No.
Cheryl again.
Officer - 0:34:25
We wouldn't be paying any cost of a third party.
You know, this is a, you know, if somebody wants to put in a complaint,
it's their decision to put into a complaint.
But if they have somebody acting on their behalf,
that would not be a cost borne by the council.
There was some investigation about the complaint.
Councillor Len Wilkins - 0:34:43
There was some sort of toxic problem and they had to go to a toxic ecologist to investigate
it.
Is there any way they can get their money back on that?
We have to pay it?
Specialist have you been of view?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:35:05
Well, I would have thought the complainant would be wise to point out the danger of something
toxic, and the council would then follow that up and employ their own person or get a consultant
if it was a reasonable request.
That would be the sensible thing to do rather than somebody take it upon themselves.
Otherwise, we'd be encouraging people to complain all the time about things that are going wrong
on the environment because it saves us the cost.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:35:36
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:35:36
I've already come across this sort of scenario,
but it was a planning application
and someone in the ward decided to go off
and pay a planning consultant to give them information
on what they were dealing with and the avenues, which hit me for six because the amount of
information that I was getting back from them and the questions asked and how thorough they
were going, I was like very, in my life, out of the water a little bit.
But they didn't go for costs or anything about that, but it was very interesting how much
people will go out and spend similarly.
similarly, I I don't know if we need to sort of guide the general public on that a little or do we just let anybody
Free spirit for them to go and spend their money how they feel. I suppose it's up to them
It's difficult
Well, I don't know whether Angela has any view of that. No, we
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:36:41
possibly advise the public
Angela Claridge - 0:36:45
Thank You chair at the end of the day we can only advise
and individuals who feel strongly about a particular subject will, if necessary, engage
whatever support they need at whatever cost.
I mean, potentially we could include something in the policy that says, makes it clear that
we don't reimburse any fees incurred by the complainant.
I suppose we could include something along those lines, because if somebody in fact particularly
aggrieved and Len gave an example of toxicology or it could be getting external legal advice
or whatever form of specialist advice.
I suppose we could make it clear in the policy.
Perhaps that would be a way forward.
I could see Cheryl's nodding at me,
so I think that might be a good way forward.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:37:30
I just feel that, as Len said,
I think it's just if we're not careful,
we could get caught.
Only the ones, but it could be painful.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:37:42
Well, thank you for that. Yes.
I can imagine a situation where we publish data
on pollution as a result of assessment and somebody comes along and says I've got my
own concern and you're wrong. But then, you know, we just need to make that clearer. I
think that's quite a good point.
Councillor Coleman.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:38:04
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:38:07
I just wondered if we're ready to look at the Annex B, the Staff Personal Safety Policy
and this Personal Safety Register.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:38:15
I think we are. I'd just like to point out an error at the bottom of page 32. It says
the member, that's me, presumably isn't it?
What do you mean responsibility?
Ah, responsible, which I don't like.
Just delete the R, yes.
Okay, if you wouldn't mind. Are we happy to do that? There is a section here on self -assessment
under section 9, I wondered if there was any merit
in having member, Councillor representation
when you do that self -assessment,
or is that really covered if there is an annual report
from the Ombudsman?
I am just thinking,
this self -assessment sounds very internal to officers, really.
Is there some merit in having a council of view?
Officer - 0:39:16
Yes, so what we'll be doing is doing a complete
self -assessment to say, right, okay, here's the complaints
that we've had as a council.
This is our response times.
This is the remedy.
This is what we've learned.
And we'll be bringing it back to this,
so order and governance to present.
And we'll also bring back the Ombudsman report as well.
And then that assessment also goes to the Ombudsman as well.
We will be bringing it here for comment and input from members as an annual process.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:39:50
Just to confirm, you might recall that we bring an annual report here
Angela Claridge - 0:39:53
on complaints.
You have seen it quite recently, which is the Ombudsman report.
The Ombudsman report is always July, so we bring out our report in September.
So what Cheryl is outlining is essentially an extension of that.

9 Statement of Accounts and Audit Opinion

Ana Prelici, Officer - 0:40:42
Ana Prelici, Officer - 0:40:43
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:40:45
Sorry, as long as the bits that we've edited as such are subject to amendment, then I'm
fine with it.
That's fine.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:41:16
Well, yes, I don't actually have anything to say at this point.
Officer - 0:41:23
Can I go to the next slide?
Yeah, sure.
So we do have a register at the moment.
What we haven't got is a really tight policy around it.
So this is just tightening up.
And we just thought because it goes hand in hand with the
campaigns policy and it's actually something the
ombudsman actually recommends to have in place,
we felt it was good time to bring this back to for
overview as it links directly into that policy.
So it basically sets out a process in terms of managing
where we've got unreasonable behaviour.
And this can be from, you know,
somebody raising vexatious complaints.
So we get, you know, continued complaints
around the same subject to some, you know,
where we may have a dangerous property which may, you know,
maybe a dangerous dog or incidents happened there before.
And it's where we'll have a central record
that will have restricted access so the staff, and restricted
to those who sort of need access, so we'd have sort of senior managers access, but
those who have regular contact with customers would have
access to it. And then a tighter process around how people or customers or
properties go on to that register, how long they stay on that register, better
processes around monitoring if we're having continual issues and then making
sure that if somebody is on that register and they've been put on a safe
three months that they are taken off it after three months. So there's just
better controls around it and that will be monitored by,
we have a governance group which has myself on,
it has the data protection officer on,
it has all the monitoring officers and governance
and directors on legal and counter fraud,
so we'd be monitoring the compliance with the policy.
It does sound extremely thorough.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:43:06
You thought of every possible reason
why somebody could be considered to be unreasonable.
And you're saying that this is in operation already?
Officer - 0:43:18
Yeah, we do have a process for recording where we have
customers who have been put on a register, you know,
they're not allowed to maybe come into council offices or,
you know, they've been put on because they're continually
raising complaints maybe about the same subject or, you know,
maybe targeting an officer.
So we have a register in place at the moment.
There isn't a huge, we're not talking huge volumes
on this register you know we're you know talking small numbers we haven't got a
huge amount of unreasonable behavior but it's just tightening up those processes
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:43:53
around it. Are there any questions or comments? Councillor Coleman first of all. Yes yes
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:43:56
chair that um one I hadn't expected to ask 4 .2 properties of risk I read that
as being places where people own or live you know properties meaning houses or
or buildings, but I think in the presentation our officer
suggested it might also include dangerous dogs.

8 Customer Complaints Policy and Procedure

And I'm wondering whether properties is quite the white
and whether that's the correct inclusive noun for dogs
as well as houses.
If it is, I'm not legally trained, that's fair enough.
And I did wonder how long we've had this black list,
sorry, this PSR, because it does connect with some other things
that are quite important, particularly since people
may be anxious to find out if they've got any self -awareness,
and they are one of our more trying customers.
They might want to find out if they're on the list.
I think that's a subject access data request or something.
You can find out everything that somebody's got about you.
And I'm wondering whether that's very difficult for us
to deal with.
Will people be able to find out if they're on this PSR list?
It does say that Councillors will not normally be allowed to have access to the list.
I accept that.
The context of this discussion is, it is worth remembering, it is a few decades ago,
an officer from the planning department up in the north east was shot dead by somebody who did not agree with an enforcement action.
There was quite a lot of fuss at the time.
Unfortunately, not much of that has happened since.
But the LGA is also very concerned
about the safety of councillors,
many of whom in some of our more challenged urban areas
do feel under attack from members of their community.
So, trying to make it sound a little bit more structured,
are there any other things that come under properties
apart from buildings and dogs?
Is there any subject actors request access to this list, this list of the people to avoid?
And perhaps we ought to include, we ought to think about whether councillors should be tipped off in advance about people in their area who might be a risk to them.
And then thirdly this is clearly an area where I think all councillors need
Sufficiently timed and this is over enough time to be briefed on
So that they don't go like I may have done off on the wrong tangent. Thank you, sir. I
Can't see why a person should be
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:46:34
Given any information except about themselves if they're on the register and presumably they are informed
Are they not that they are on the register? That's correct. Yeah
Officer - 0:46:47
So if it's a property and we're just saying, you know, there's a we're aware that there's a dangerous dog there
They probably wouldn't we wouldn't notify that they're on that list
But if it's somebody who the sanction against and yes, there's a process where they'd be written to they may have a warning
There's a peel process
So know exactly you know, how long they've been put on the register for why and what any sanctions have been put in place
So if we've had you know abuse at a reception
so they're no longer allowed to come into the actual council offices.
They'll be notified of that and how they can continue to access council services
because we can't restrict the access.
So all of that would be notified to them with an appeals process as well.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:47:27
I suppose what Councillor Coleman is also thinking about is somebody who would be
very aggressive towards either a particular member of staff in a department
or to a particular councillor.
They're then warned off and told that they go on to the register.
but other people don't know that they're on the register.
And the same thing may happen again
with another member of staff before,
I mean, I don't quite know how you ...
Officer - 0:47:52
So, yeah, so what we're putting in place
is that every time somebody is added,
there would be a notification to those who have access,
and it would be their responsibility
to then go in there and see whether there's anything
that they need to let their staff know.
So, to say, yeah, if we had an issue within planning,
as you say, an enforcement officer, they've come back, reported it, the manager's gone through the process,
this person been put on, I keep wanting to call it the naughty person register, but the unreasonable behaviour register,
they'd be put on it and then we were then notified to say, look, there's been an update and those who have access
would then be able to go into it and Dem Services will also have access, so, you know, if a member's going out to an area,
they can ask and say, look, I'm going out to this area, is there anything I need to be aware of?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:48:37
And you have to rely on gossip, don't you, amongst councillors.
I'm sure that's a very efficient way of informing people of particular difficulties.
We could actually give you a list, I think, when we've been through an electoral process and knocked on thousands of doors,
we could actually give you a list of people who might be considered behaviour -acceptably, but that's a little bit far -fetched, perhaps.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:49:04
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:49:06
If we've got a member of our staff going to visit somebody who's on a register, do we supply them with body cameras?
Or should we supply them with body cameras?
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:49:16
This is the Cotswolds, you know. Cheryl?
Officer - 0:49:23
There'd be guidance in terms of, you know, if there was a property it may be that you have to go in pairs or actually you're not allowed to visit that property.
So there'll be that's the point that you know if you've got somebody and we know
that the resident or the dog you know whatever it may be there will be
recommendations in terms of the PSR to say you must go in pairs or actually you
must not visit this property. And the answer to Councillor Coleman's
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:49:50
questions about dogs is that there could be all kinds of endangered species I
I mean, apart from the counselors, like pythons and alligators.
I mean, any kind of dangerous personal pet could be a considered risk, and that would
be part of the property assessment, I guess.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:50:07
And you could also add cattle and cows and other things, because we're rural.
But there you go.
That's a change of subject for my question.
My question was, what are the protocols if you have got a person that's very abusive
and to staff, counsellors, anyone that's within the umbrella of CDC, where do you start the
officiating with police and other sort of more important enforcement than our ourselves?
and how is that recorded? You know where do you escalate that point?
I know there's you know there's so many different parameters within that
but where's our protocol with that?
Officer - 0:51:02
Yeah so this would link in as well into health and safety so I think we had one
recently or maybe the last six months where you know a member of staff had
gone to a door and was attacked with a glass so at that point it was
escalated. The person has obviously gone through this process but also has
escalated to the police and through to health and safety. So it's a sort of
collaborative process in terms of that a manager would be aware of
a situation and would take action accordingly and through various
trains of health and safety etc.
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 0:51:37
It was just to make sure as well just that everybody else knew that
was in touch with that in that area as we all know there's certain parts of
wards you just go in with twos and even knocking on doors and putting flyers
through it can be a bit... Surely not in your ward!
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:52:00
Yeah I'm not going to comment on that. Thank you colleagues. There is one
further paper which I've not seen before this equality impacts assessment form is
Is this used for all policies that come before the council?
I don't think I've seen this before.
Is it new?
No, it's not new.
So normally I think in the back of your report,
Officer - 0:52:21
so your covering report you'll have,
there's a statement in there around a quality's impact.
So normally if say if we're proposing a service change
or a policy change that may have an impact on people,
then a qualities impact assessment should be done to make sure that we're
not you know impacting the community. So in this instance we've produced
the impact assessment because we're changing the complaints policy but you
know we've a lot of it around accessibility and actually the state
moving from a stage or three stages stage to two stages doesn't really
impact in terms of the customer so just done a impact assessment for it.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:53:06
I see. Thank you. Councillor Coleman.
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 0:53:09
You are very patient with me, Chair. Thanks. I think, having reflected during the debate
and listened, I am still a bit concerned and I feel there is a case, at least to consider,
where the councillors, particularly after an election, should be very confidentially
brief about the cons of anybody in their ward who is on the PSR.
Because if anything can possibly go wrong, sometimes it does.
Perhaps what I was thinking was if I
could ask officers to reflect on that and check with legal
and so on to see whether it's proportionate.
I've no idea in my ward whether there's
one or five or ten people on this list,
and I'm fairly relaxed about threats and so on,
because I'm 70 or 71.
But others may be a lot more intimidated,
apart from anything else, because I've been wandering
around as a counsellor for so many years.
But for a new counsellor,
a lot of the questions and uncertainties
and may not be six foot and all the rest of it,
perhaps it is on balance,
worthwhile to give them in total and strict confidence notice of what the
council's aware of that might impact on them in terms of people on the PSR in
their ward. I'm going to ask Angela to come in here I think that's appropriate.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:54:38
Angela Claridge - 0:54:41
Thank you chair. I mean thinking more widely I wonder if actually we've done
this before we've had you know Inspector Simon Elson in from the Gloucestershire
who is our Cotswold link officer with the police force.
We have had him in the past to do short briefing sessions with members around personal safety.
I wonder if this is something we could engage with him again.
There will be individuals that we know of who have been unreasonable and aggressive
and vexatious towards council staff but there might be a much bigger list that the police
are aware of.
and it might be something that they need to advise on.
Because like you said, personal safety of councillors
is a very prominent national issue at the moment.
So I wonder if we look at it as a wider piece of work
around how we advise members generally
around your safety, which could be campaigning.
And I'm sure your parties have views about that as well.
Could be campaigning, could be constituencies,
could be turning up at somebody's house
and then being caught unawares or whatever.
So perhaps as an action chair, if I pick up
with my police contact and we'll take that forward.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:55:46
Thank you.
Yes, I think that might help.
Thank you.
Are there any other comments or questions about this piece
of work?
I know.
I think in that case, we can move on to the next item
on the agenda, please, which is the statement of accounts
and audit opinion.
I'm going to hand over to David to highlight
significant things and for him to remind us

9 Statement of Accounts and Audit Opinion

to when the deadline is for the 23, 24 accounts and opinions.
Thank you, Chair.
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 0:56:20
So this is a short report.
It builds on the verbal update I gave the committee
at the October meeting following a conversation
that myself and Michelle had with Alex and Adam
from Bishop Fleming.
This sort of confirms, I suppose,
the position we're in with the external audit work.
So that commenced in August and September and has been moving on steadily but probably
slowly in terms of the delivery of the actual audit opinion.
That's due to be delivered around about the end of December, I think is the current aim.
So the intention of this report is to set out where we currently are, that good progress
is being made and there's commitment on both the council and Bishop Fleming to achieving
an ordered opinion well in advance of the backstop date, which as the chair has set
out below paragraph 4 .3 in the report is a table of the statutory deadlines or the backstop
dates that have been legislated for.
So we need to receive our audit opinion no later than the 28th of February 2025 to comply
with that backstop date.
If that is not possible, there is usually a limitation provided to an audit opinion.
That's not somewhere that either ourselves as the Council or Bishop Fleming think is
likely.
But clearly there will be a number of audits that won't be completed by that point.
We're not in that position very clearly.
Just to give you some contextual information, 521 audit opinions for the audit years 2018 -19
through to 2022 -23 remained outstanding as at the end of September.
And of the 23 -24 audits, there are around about 530 opinions that are due to be lodged.
Around half of that are due to be unmodified opinions,
which would be in that group, but there's an equal number
or thereabouts where there is some risk that they won't
be able to get that opinion prior to the backstop date.
So we're not expecting any significant issues.
Nothing has been highlighted to us so far by Bishop Fleming,
and we are working through audit queries as they come through,
so we have a dedicated resource within the finance team
to respond and prepare adequate working papers to answer any queries they have.
And just finally, I suppose on that in terms of the recommendation, is I suppose given
the potential closeness the next scheduled meeting of Audit Committee has to that backstop
date, there is a recommendation within the report to delegate authority to myself in
consultation with the chair of audit and governance committee
to receive the audit opinion and sign that off,
subject to those papers being circulated to all members of the
committee a good week prior to that delegation being exercised
to give everyone the opportunity to have good oversight of those.
But happy to take any questions members have.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 0:59:41
Yes, well, we'll delay assessing that resolution until we've had
a chance to talk about it.
I'm pleased that you've said that we've got a dedicated resource because Grant Thornton
did comment, didn't they, that they felt that we hadn't sufficient resource some months
ago and that that was one of their reasons, not the only reason, of course, why there
were delays.
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 1:00:18
So, I sort of another important date which is perhaps has already been missed,
but what date do Bishop Fleming have to have with our help,
got these accounts signed off, in order to do better than Grant Thornton did in their last year at this job?
And in passing, we did notice, some of us, and I think you did too, that as Grant Thornton's
latter years went through, they started to make rather more recommendations, which started
to take up more office time.
I might be entirely wrong about that, it was how it seemed to me as a member that they
were starting to justify their existence a little bit, perhaps justify the higher fees
they wanted.
It would be perfectly reasonable for Bishop Fleming in their first year of his job to
I have a few questions and I want to make a mark, not that that would be professional
and therefore I withdraw the suggestion right away.
But seriously, how are they doing and because to some extent this is a learning curve for
our auditors, it's their first time at the game with us.
So each external auditor will take their own approach to the council, taking into account
the inherent risks they may have identified as part of their audit scoping.
So Bishop Fleming did provide us with their audit plan back in the July meeting
and that set out the approach they would be taking. It's fair to say that I think
Grant Thornton's delivery of previous audit opinions had a cumulative impact.
If they weren't able to deliver the 21 -22 audit opinion in time that knocked
on to their ability to start and deliver the 22 -23 audit opinion.
And there wasn't at the time at Grant Thornton, our external audit, has any backstop date
in place, which is why you've got the situation that's set out through the PSAA contract monitoring
that there's 521 audit opinions potentially going back as far as 2018 -19 that have yet
to be signed off.
And there is a backstop date at the end of December that will cut off those particular
audit opinions.
In terms of how the audit is going, we maintain a really positive
dialogue with Alex and Adam on a regular basis. As I said, they haven't, in
the call that we had on the 23rd of October, identified any significant
concerns. They are working through with the dedicated resource, which is an
interim resource we've got Dean who's provided additional capacity into the
finance team to allow Michelle and Hazel to juggle the workload so he's able to prepare
a lot of that work in advance of Michelle and Hazel reviewing it and passing that through
to Bishop Fleming.
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:03:02
It's fair to say that I think Bishop Fleming being a new auditor will of course understand
that they need to make their own judgement on whether or not the level of recommendations
that were made by previous auditors is where they want to be.
So they've essentially got to assess that themselves.
So they're not, whilst they have due regard to a previous auditors findings,
they need to make their own assessment.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:03:31
Yes, sir.
Councillor Michael Vann - 1:03:36
There's a very good sentence here and I appreciate that you've amplified it a little bit.
Whilst good progress has been made and audit queries raised by Bishop Fleming have been responded to in a timely manner
It has not been possible for the audit work to be completed in time
And an opinion to be issued for this committee meeting very good centers
Doesn't actually say
What where?
the issue lies at the moment now I judge from my reading of that sentence that
it's with Bishop Fleming as opposed to with CDC comment please in the early I
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:04:30
would just say in the early stages of Bishop Fleming's work we need to be
quite discreet.
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:04:36
I'm sure David will be.
I shall take a diplomatic route through this.
It is fair to say Bishop Fleming being a newly established
public sector, i .e.
local authority audit body, they are taking their time
to work from one client to the next.
They started with Forest of Dean.
They're working with us.
They've started with West Oxfordshire.
And I believe South Oxfordshire are last on their list
in the current round.
So they are ensuring they spread that resource across all of their clients to ensure that
they can deliver all of their audits in a timely manner.
I think it's they have also recognised the need to deal with what they can deal with
at the time they've been in and to come back with further queries when they've completed
that work.
There's quite a different approach to what we saw with Grant Thornton and I'm fairly
I think it would be comfortable to say that having checked paragraph 8 .1 with Bishop Fleming
prior to publication that they are content that I've made what I called a bold statement
on their behalf that we were both confident that they would have adequate resources to
complete the audit in a timely manner.
I think the reality is they've been ensuring that all audits can start and complete by
Councillor Michael Vann - 1:06:03
that backstop date. An excellent answer.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:06:10
Councillor Jeremy Theyer - 1:06:14
Councillor Wilkins. Thank you Chair. The question is we've got a backstop what
happens if we miss it do we get into put in detention given lines or what what
is a penalty, if there is a penalty?
There is no financial penalty.
There is a reputational risk.
If we were in the position where there was not an opinion that could be managed or delivered
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:06:49
within the time scale that is set out in the backstop date, then the auditor would, as
set out in Paragraph 4 .4 and 4 .5, have to assess whether or not they had sufficient
evidence of the audit work completed to be able to issue an audit opinion, and if they
couldn't issue an unmodified audit opinion, would put in place a limitation of scope.
So that would essentially say we have audited and been able to complete, let's say, 75 %
of the audit.
They probably wouldn't use a number they would cover off what they have completed.
But we are unable to give you a full unmodified opinion, therefore we will give our opinion
on the basis that we are limiting it to this area we have looked at.
For some authorities that may be that the auditor has not, given the backlog they have
got to be able to issue any opinion, therefore the modified opinion is there is no opinion
to provide. That will put them in a slightly more risky position in terms of the auditor
assessing the following year's accounts, because there isn't any assurance that they can take
from opening and closing balances from one year to the next, and may increase the fee
that that authority would need to pay the auditor to complete the accounts because the
risk has gone up and the amount of work that the auditor would have to undertake to gain
that assurance will go through.
So there isn't any financial penalty but clearly getting a modified opinion is not somewhere
a place that an authority wants to be and there would be a list of those authorities
that have received modified opinions published by the PSAA and no doubt that
would circulate amongst the trade press so those in local government finance but
also would be picked up by by the wider public in terms of any reputational risk
there may be to the council from residents. John. Thank you chair. Just to
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:09:01
John Chesshire - 1:09:03
follow on from that in terms of sort of reputational impact firstly I think it's
unlikely based upon what you've said and what we've read that would be in that
position but if we were probably now's the best time to be in that position
because there will be hundreds of local authorities that are in that position
this time round. At that end of February date is quite challenging for many.
It's not ideal obviously but the reality is we would be lost in the noise a little.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:09:40
If there are no other comments or questions, then perhaps we can just agree or not.
Approve the recommendation.
Approve the recommendation, yes, to note the progress, but more important, to delegate
authority to David here and myself to receive and sign the audit opinion.
I mean, you've asked all the key questions about the uncertainties of a new set of external
auditors taking over at this time.
So we're mindful of those questions and, you know, we will only respond if we're happy
with what's produced.
So would you like to just indicate, please, that you're happy with that delegation?
Thank you.
I suppose I must be too.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:10:36
...mid -year report on Treasury and Management.
Am I right that the red signs indicate the movements since last time?
Is that more or less it?
There doesn't seem to be a huge amount of movement.
We now have three of these reports a year, don't we, I think?
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:10:58
Thank you, Chair. This is one of the prescribed reports, but there are quarterly reports in
Q1 and Q3 that we would be bringing to the committee to give you a more timely update,
rather than at the start of the year with the strategy, the midpoint, which is this
report and the end of the year after the financial year has closed.
So this is more a dry report compared to some others
that you will receive.
It goes through the Treasury management position,
and as part of my preparation for this committee,
I dug out last year's papers to compare and contrast
the position that was set out in this year's half -year report,
and I suppose how it compared to the previous year's report,
because there are a number of similarities.
Interest rates are remaining relatively high,
So, investment returns are fairly solid.
Conversely, if the council had borrowing and a number of
authorities do, we only have the small amount of borrowing
we took on from the climate bond investment.
That would obviously impact.
And whilst inflation has come down, it's gone a little bit
back up and is forecast to be probably above the Bank of
England's two percentile grid for most of 2025.
But marginally so.
So in terms of the Treasury management position, the balance sheet summary is the first table
that's set out on page 62.
That indicates that we started the year with net investments of $24 .5 million and we're
projecting the reduction in those net investments of around about $6 million.
For those of you that may be interested in what we said this time last year, because
this might help you understand where we are, last year we anticipated moving from an opening
balance of 28 billion down to a closing balance of 20 million.
So there was a reduction, but not quite as significant as the forecast suggested.
So that's largely, as you can see, the reduction is coming through in the use of usable reserves.
That's largely the capital receipts and some of the other revenue EMR reserves that are
being deployed to support the revenue budget in the current year.

10 Treasury Management Mid-Year Report

The Treasury Management Summary, which is on Table 2, shows that we have actually increased
our balance holding in the first half of the year from the opening 24 .5 million to 28 .5
million, so it's moved by about four million pounds.
And the average rate of return on those investments
that has been achieved is 4 .68 percent.
That compares to last year's report, which
indicated our rate of return was 4 .78 percent.
So barely any movement, although some of the
different investment holdings have changed in
terms of the percentage return they deliver.
But broadly similar, on a broadly similar level of
cash balance.
Section 5 takes you through the Treasury management investment position in a little bit more detail
with the pooled funds, largely in paragraph 5 .1.
We talk about investment balances ranging between 42 million and 22 million, so that's
quite a big range.
That's largely and predominantly due to the timing of council tax and business rates receipts
that are received at the front end of the year before we have
to pay the 100 percent of our precepting partner shares across
to them by the end of the financial year.
So there's usually a heightened level of balance to begin with
in the financial year that starts dropping away as we catch
up with those precept payments that are set and determined at
the start of each year.
In terms of the overall investment performance,
We have got a positive position on investment performance.
We are expecting around about £376 ,000 of additional
Treasury management income over and above the
budgeted level.
That's been going to be reported in the Quarter 2
financial report that Cabinet will be considering
their meeting in December.
And that's largely on the expectation that interest
interest rates will remain pretty much where they are at 4 .75 % in terms of the Bank of
England base rate until at least February of 2025. So no further interest rate cuts
are expected and the market is effectively pricing that change in. So currently we are
able to achieve relatively strong returns on our short -term cash balances because interest
rates that are paid on holding those cash balances have remained relatively strong.
Well, paragraph 6 .2 is worth pointing out.
That provides you a brief commentary on the longer term
investments, the pooled funds, particularly the final sentence
which says, as at the 30th of September,
there is a capital loss of just short of a million pounds
on those investments.
And that's important to bear in mind,
because it's not a real loss.
It's an unrealized loss at the moment.
and there is a statutory reversal of that loss,
a statutory override that's put in place from a counting perspective
to ensure that doesn't hit the Council's bottom line.
That statutory override, unless it is extended, is due to end on the 31st of March 2025.
So if we were looking at this in 12 months' time, we had a capital loss of 967 ,000
and the statutory override had not been renewed, the council would have to ensure
it had adequate balances on its reserves and on its balance sheet to be
able to finance that loss regardless of whether it was a realised loss or not.
So it's worth pointing that out. Some clarity is needed from the government on
a couple of statutory overrides, this being one of them, the other one being
for those authorities that have dedicated schools grant where there is
usually a quite significant deficit on those dedicated
schools grants running into the tens, if not hundreds of
millions of pounds across the sector.
Finally, there's a graph on page 68, which hopefully has
been printed out in color.
In your packs last year it was in shades of gray, which
made it very difficult to determine where our authority
was in the overall returns graph.
It's a fairly flat graph.
We are towards the right -hand side of that graph,
achieving that 4 .68 percent.
To give you a rough indication, for every million
pounds, if we moved about half a percent, it would
generate about 5 ,000 pounds.
So there's not a lot to choose between those, given
the current position on short -term interest rates.
But that graph will change composition as those
short -term interest rates reduce and the longer -term
investments start to pick up in terms of their importance to the overall level of return.
Finally, Annex A deals with what is my affectionate term, the history lesson from Arlene Close,
where they were setting out their view of the global economic background as it was at
the end of September.
There's probably only one word I need to say to you, which is Trump.
I think that will change pretty much everything that they have said in that economic forecast,
because that was obviously prior to the US elections that were held earlier this month.
Happy to take any questions.
Thank you very much David. Yes.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:18:47
Councillor Colvin.
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 1:18:56
We do like to hear about beating our budget when it comes to income and paragraph 5 .3.
Mark will be precise estimate I thought which is encouraging
that we could exceed our budget for by 376 ,000.
Could our officer just remind us, I know he knows it by heart,
what the annual figure, the comparative figure was for 2324.
Was it 500 or 700 million? A thousand, sorry.
It was quite a little bit bigger than this anyway.
I shall check, but I believe the level of investment return we got for the year
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:19:29
was around about 1 .7 million in 23 -24 which was about nine hundred thousand
more than we had budgeted for so we did increase the budget for this year
recognizing the higher level of interest rates so it moved up to about 1 .3
million so we have already within the budget captured some of that get benefit
but there's a clearly another bit of benefit that we took a very prudent view
and to not rely on Treasury management investment to underpin the budgets too
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 1:20:00
much. One more question, Chair. Arling Close are associated with rather good news for this
Council over, I suppose, quite a few years, but when are they next up to have their contract
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:20:18
renewed in competition with others like them? I shall provide you with a written response
on that, I do not have that date etched in my brain. I believe we have renewed the contract
in the relative recent period in the last 18 months. They are usually for a three to
five year period. As you will see, Arlen Close have about 25 % of the local authority market.
There is one other provider of Treasury management services that has the other bit of that market.
There is usually only two to choose from.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:20:49
Yes, we did suggest, actually, that they might come and do a presentation before the end
of our association with Publica.
I would have thought we might invite, if that were the case, we could invite other people
from other authorities, because those that I've experienced in the past in another place
have been very illuminating and helpful.
If we look at that graph, I think we've fallen back a bit in the last year or two.
I mean, I suppose if you wanted a really clear assessment, you'd have to not only indicate
the returns on your investment but have a table which shows the liabilities of those
councils compared with their income or expenditure. In other words, they might have far higher
debts than we have, so that it would push us up the table.
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:21:59
but in response to that chair there is a number of other graphs that are
enclosed provide with their benchmarking report that they give to us on a
quarterly basis probably the one that is most useful is to assess the level of
return the council is getting for the average weighted risk the council is
taking with those investments so really where you want to be is low risk and
return. So clearly what this graph doesn't show is the amount of risk those
authorities are taking with those investments. That's something to bear in
mind. So we can provide that information in a more digestible form because it is
a Excel spreadsheet with several graphs and several tables of numbers but it
probably would be useful to get Arlene Close to come in and provide an
overview of the Treasury management position to members of this committee and
more widely where they can talk through I suppose options that are available for
councils to improve those returns if they saw fit without necessarily bringing
with it any undue additional risk because the the investment principle is
sly security liquidity yield in that order so we've got to make sure the
Council's money is secure and readily available before we start looking at yield.
But clearly we've got a diversified portfolio of investments both in terms of duration but
also in terms of counterparties and that can form part of a review that Arlen Close could
undertake if members were minded with the support of cabinet to review the Treasury
management position to ensure that we are maximising those returns.
but on a day -to -day basis that is something that the officers do to ensure that when they're
placing short -term funds they're maximising that return and there is occasionally a need
to move money between different money market funds only to ensure that you're getting the
best return which might only be a matter of two or three basis points but it all does
add up.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:24:08
The very sharp eyes will notice on that coloured graph, there are some authorities right across
actually where there is what they describe as an over performance of external funds.
Does that mean that they are slightly more at risk, do you think?
David Stanley, Deputy CEO - 1:24:25
I think it would be difficult for me to comment without reviewing the wider commentary from
Arlene Close.
but yes there is I suppose their external funds are above and beyond the
average that I would defer to Arlen Close to provide a more adequate
response to that particular question.
Councillor Patrick Coleman - 1:25:11
Chair, this one is recommended to Council for approval.
That's what we've got to do.
Ana Prelici, Officer - 1:25:28
.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:26:20
Yes, I beg your pardon. There will be different levels of enthusiasm for members in respect
of the items there, but it looks to me, and I'm grateful for officers for arranging it
in such a way that it looks to be a thoroughly manageable agenda,
as I think this has been really.

11 Work Plan

It certainly enables Chris to go off in good time.
Are there any comments on this external auditors annual report,
corporate governance?
That's just an update, I guess.
Yes, another look at the Treasury management, well, at its strategy, and then we've got
a cyber security update, which I don't recall that we've had for some time.
Year plus ago?
Yes, okay.
There would be a lot of interest in it at this committee.
As we know from the risk management register, it's very high risk.
So are we happy?
If we're happy, then can I thank you and close the meeting?
Yes.
Just before then, I'd be very reluctant to confirm again at a future meeting that I was happy having seen a return on total investments where we were really in some company I wouldn't want to be with.
So I thought about interrupting and saying can we please be content.
I think there's a substantial difference between being content, that's life, and being happy.
Councillor Michael Vann - 1:28:23
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:28:28
A repost here from the Deputy Leader of the Council, Mike.
Councillor Mike Evemy - 1:28:33
I just wanted to maybe add a bit to what David has said and maybe maybe a bit
blunter than he said it in the meeting we're still in the meeting I don't mind
if we're in the meeting but essentially that the issue Michael is that we don't
know what the what the investment profiles of all those councils are so I
think they've alluded to in you basically we've got the 10 million pound
in pooled funds which isn't getting quite as much as if you had it in cash
so if those other councils have got their money in cash they're probably
getting more than we are.
So, but that's not a reason we want to come out
of the pool funds because they're long term investments.
So I think we shouldn't take too much stall
by that one graph.
And the thing about the graph is not where we are
in the ordinal, I think it's the differential.
But you know, if we were right down the bottom,
if we were getting 1 % less than everyone else,
I would be worried.
The fact that you know, actually it's a pretty flat graph
means that I'm not too worried about it
because we've got obviously David overseeing it
and we've got the investment team that work on it
and we've got Arlen close advising.
And so I'm not worried that we're missing out on something
because we looked at in that report
the different performances we're getting
from the different things.
And I think it's more,
we've got to look at those compared to the market,
not one graph, which is only indicative in its sense.
But I get your point.
Obviously we want to be near the top of the graph
and the bottom, but I think David said to us,
but you don't want to be there
because you're doing lots of risky stuff
because you could end up right down the bottom.
Down the bottom means, you know, 2 % below everyone else or something.
Councillor Nigel Robbins - 1:30:06
Yes, David did say that another graph will show the risk level alongside the returns
and that might provide a little bit more comfort.
But, yeah, nobody likes to be at the bottom of the table for whatever reason.
But as explained, there is some security in having a fairly high weighting in pooled funds.
But thank you.
And thank you everybody else too.