Agenda item

Report by the Director of Finance.

This is the annual report of the Chief Internal Auditor, summarising the outcome of the Internal Audit work in 2022/23, and providing an opinion on the Council's System of Internal Control.

The Audit & Governance Committee is RECOMMENDED to consider and endorse the annual report.

Sarah Cox, Chief Internal Auditor, presented the item.  She stated that she had provided an opinion on the Council's System of Internal Control and it is one of the sources of assurance for the Annual Governance Statement.  She had found that there was satisfactory assurance regarding Oxfordshire County Council's overall control environment and the arrangements for governance, risk management and control.  Ms Cox explained that in addition to the annual self-assessment against the standards being completed by the Chief Internal Auditor, it was a requirement of the Public Sector Internal Audit Standards 2017 (PSIAS) for an external assessment of internal audit to be completed at least every five years. The external assessment had been booked for the beginning of October 2023.  The results would be reported to the January 2024 Audit & Governance Committee meeting.

Ms Cox provided an update on the staffing vacancy.  This had been backfilled to some extent using an external firm and an employee returning to the Council on a part time basis as Principal Auditor.  Efforts would continue to be made to appoint a Senior Auditor.  The vacancy had impacted on the delivery of the 2022/23 revised plan as it had not been possible to complete seven audits by the end of April.  However, the revised plan had now been completed, subject to these audits at exit meeting / draft report stage being finalised by the end of May.  It had been possible to deliver a sufficient amount of the plan to provide the overall opinion.  An executive summary of the seven audits would be submitted to the next meeting of the Committee in July. 

Ms Cox also referred to the one audit which had been graded ‘red’ in 2022/23.  This had been for a school which had financial management and governance concerns.  A new headteacher was in post now and most of the management actions arising from the audit report had been implemented.  Due to its confidential nature, further information relating to this matter was likely to be provided to the Audit Working Group.

In response to a question on what impact there had been as a result of the staffing vacancy on the monitoring of actions from previous audits, Ms Cox responded that the figures had not shown any clear impact.  However, during the last couple of months it had not been possible to devote additional resource to the monitoring of actions and there was likely to have to be a catch up period in the summer.  There was still a monthly report to the Council’s Strategic Leadership Team (SLT) members and corporate directors and a monitoring process in place.

Following a request, it was agreed that a relevant officer would provide further information to Committee Members on the work of the Climate Change Programme Board which was referred to in the report.

The Chair thanked Ms Cox and her Internal Audit team for the actual performance set out in the report for 2022/23, including the improvement in completions.

RESOLVED: That the Chief Internal Auditor’s Annual Report be endorsed by the Committee.

ACTION: That a relevant officer be required to provide further information on the work of the Climate Change Programme Board.