23 Programme Highlight Report including Internal Audit report produced by SWAP PDF 833 KB
To consider the Highlight
Report – August 2018 which includes an Internal Audit report and follow up
report produced by SWAP to provide a high-level review of the LGR programme
governance.
This report for the Shadow Executive Committee will be
considered at the meeting of the committee on 21 August 2018.
Additional documents:
Minutes:
In
response to a request by the committee at the last meeting, members received a
copy of the Highlight Report – August 2018, considered by the Shadow Executive
Committee at their meeting on 21 August 2018, which included a Programme
Governance Report and follow up report produced by South West Audit Partnership
(SWAP). Sally White, representing SWAP,
attended to provide an overview of the issues raised in the reports.
Detail
of the ‘Headline Conclusions’ from the initial report was set out at page 21 of
the agenda. In response to these points
raised, the Programme Director had provided a detailed report on progress made
in the areas and this had led to SWAP producing a follow up report. It was noted that the follow up report set
out that the direction of travel was positive and identified key changes such
as the formation of new themed boards and changes to previous task and finish
groups. The report also recommended a
schedule of further detailed audit work.
Members
considered the issues arising from the reports and during discussion the
following points were raised:
·
Members were aware of the amount of work to be undertaken and the short
time scale for undertaking the work required to meet the 1 April 2019 deadline
·
It was noted that support could be provided by the Centre for Public
Scrutiny and the Local Government Association
·
Reference was made to comments made in the report with regard to Dorset
County Council involvement and support in terms of their contribution to the
Shaping Dorset Council programme and consideration was given to inviting
representatives of Dorset County Council to the next meeting of the committee
to discuss these issues with them
·
The Programme Director provided information on the level of staffing
within the team which currently stood at 21 people with recruitment
ongoing. In addition nearly 200 people
within the councils were engaged with the plans including an oversight of areas
and work around service continuity. He
felt that significant progress had been made since the first SWAP report had
been produced. The SWAP report had been
requested by the Programme Board to ensure that processes and capacity for the
work was in place
·
Members recognised that improvements had been made but some issues had
been carried forward to the update report
·
Further audit work was to be undertaken to look at the governance of the
programme
· An externally run Gateway review towards the end of September 2018 would involve SWAP and a transformation consultant and would set out to confirm whether the discovery phase had been satisfactorily completed in readiness for the main implementation phase. A second Gateway review would take place towards the end of January 2019 and would confirm all work carried out along with any contingency plan for any areas not covered. The ‘go live’ date for the new Council could not be moved but there could be consideration as to what would be in place by 1 April 2019 and what plans needed to ... view the full minutes text for item 23