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The decisions as the council's minutes record them. A plain-language summary follows once it has been written.
RESOLVED to exclude the public for the following items of business on the grounds that there would be disclosure to them of exempt information under category 3 of The Local Authorities (Access to Information) (Variation) (Wales) Order 2007). The Monitoring Officer has determined that category 3 of the Access to Information Procedure Rules applies to the following items. His view on the public interest test (having taken account of the provisions of Rule 14.8 of the Council's Access to Information Rules) was that to make this information public would disclose information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information). These factors in his view outweigh the public interest in disclosing this information. Members are asked to consider these factors when determining the public interest test, which they must decide when considering excluding the public from this part of the meeting. Proposed By Member Cllr William Powell and Seconded By Member Cllr Chris Walsh
Apologies for absence were received from: County Councillors & Cabinet Members: James Gibson Watt Leader, Matthew Dorrance Deputy Leader, Jake Berriman and Sandra Davies. Officers: Andy Thompson and Ellen Sullivan.
There were no Declarations of Interest from Members relating to items to be considered on the agenda.
Governance and Audit Committee resolved to authorise the Chair to sign the minutes as a true reflection of the meeting held on 1st March 2024, once The Director of Social Care, Nina Davies had been included as an attendee.
Matthew Brushett from Audit Wales gave a brief overview to the report as taken as read. There were no questions raised from Committee Members.
Background: Audit Wales – Martin Gibson. · Thematic Audit undertaken across all 22 LA’s in Wales, National findings will be published in Summer 2024. · Draft report was shared with Senior Officers and published in the 12th April. · Performance information around outcomes and the perspective of Service Users is key part of the establishing how the Council was achieving value for money against projects. · Review looked at core reports used by the Council and would the performance data enable leaders to understand activities to effectively manage performance. Main findings: 1. The performance information provided to Senior Leaders to comprehensively understand the perspective of Service Users varied considerable across the Services. · Recommendation – To strengthen information provided. 2. To ensure the Performance information reflected the Service User perspective and outcomes information was accurate, found that the arrangements were limited. · Recommendation – The Council needs to assure itself that robust arrangements were in place to check the quality and accuracy of data information. The review, however, did not verify the accuracy of any data. 3. The Council did not comprehensively use performance information to achieve outcomes of service areas. · Recommendation – The Council should ensure that information provided to Senior Leaders about outcomes reflects the range of the actions it was taking to deliver objectives. The Council has reviewed the effectiveness of its arrangements, resulting in greater clarity around outcomes but has had less impact on reporting the Service User perspective. Audit Wales findings were that the performance data information provided to Senior Leaders did not enable them to have an understanding of the Service User perspective and outcomes, restricting the ability to understand the impact of the Councils services and policies. Audit Wales have received a response from the Council and following discussions, remain unsatisfied that the recommendations made in the Report have been properly considered, and intended to follow up these recommendation in future Audit work. In response Officers noted: The fieldwork or evidence collection undertaken was from May and July 2023 and based on the previous Corporate and Strategic Equality Plan (CESP) known as ”Vision 2025”, and previous Performance Management Quality Assurance framework. The Council now has a new CESP “Stronger, Fairer, Greener” and a new performance approach implemented from April 2023. For this Audit, 3 interviews were conducted by Audit Wales, the information that the organisation has would allow Senior Leaders to understand how well the Council was delivering its objectives and outcomes, with many mechanisms to capture information. The Corporate Plan provided the strategic overview, with Service User voice captured as identified in the Public Participation Strategy, at an operational level, through service quarterly performance reporting against the Integrated Business Plans, annual service area self-assessments, which in turn feed into the whole Council Self-Assessment. All of these were subject to several layers of sense checking and scrutiny at different levels. The Senior Leaders ensure that the voice of the Service User was understood as formed a basis for Well-being assessments and the CESP. Last year an Audit set out how the wellbeing objectives were set out for the CESP with engagement throughout the process with Service Users and the use of a diverse range of information to shape the Corporate Plan, focussed on what mattered most to individuals both now and into the future. Service User feedback was used regularly at an operational level to support service delivery and continual improvement. For Recommendation 3 the Corporate Leadership Team had agreed to take steps to more strongly integrate the data quality aspect with the Internal Audit Team. The Service User voice was at the heart of the Sustainable Powys programme and the Council had actively engaged with representatives of over 140 community groups to understand, the now, the future planning, the meeting of needs of individuals and by community area. Engagement has commenced with Town and Community Councils, 100 Young people from High Schools across the County attended an engagement event to discuss what good looked like to them, covering topic areas such as housing and democracy with the service users voice and views captured. A comprehensive customer service targeted approach to the delivery of services was undertaken which ensured individuals could feed information back, which was subsequently provided to Audit Wales, in response to its findings. A business directory has been established which allows for ongoing dialogue, in addition new Cluster groups were set up for open dialogue with Powys’ skills providers which obtained the learner voice. In terms of Audit Wales’ introduction, which was clear on areas not looked at during this thematic review, the Senior Leadership felt a lot of the information would have been available and could have been noted to possibly strengthened the outcome of the report. Performance data was available, particularly with the Service User perspective, which included from a Corporate Services perspective, the internal customer, who were also service users. Surveys were undertaken routinely across schools and the organisation. Embedded within performance reporting was information on complaints and compliments, the performance of staff, how were workloads being managed. The Council recognised there was always room for improvement and would progress these elements through work on Sustainable Powys. The Service User was fundamental, through their feedback and a programme of engagement to assist in the re-shaping of services. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: What were the outputs of the annual budget deliver in terms of performance and how these aggregate to the long-term aspirations of the CESP. Noted by the Director of Corporate Services. Point in the Audit Wales summary raised concern as was the Council providing Services that resident felt were or were not wanted, and what were the financial implications when setting budgets and Council Tax. In terms of our residents there were 2 aspects, the Council has to be much more thoughtful in regard to need rather than want of residents, although understood that may be a key aspect for how we deliver services, from a financial perspective and the statutory responsibilities of the Council, services would not be delivered necessarily by what we want to see but by the statutory obligation to fulfil needs of those most vulnerable in society. There were budgetary implications, which was always a key consideration as take Sustainable Powys programme forward, understanding demand, need and securing the most to fulfil those needs in the most efficient way and demonstrating value for money. Were there any trends across the 22 LA’s in particular in regard to rurality and difficulties, could this have had an impact on engagement. In terms of dual control or split responsibilities, were complicating factors noted i.e., the Housing and Regeneration function without holding the planning function and was there any consideration to extend the review to the 3 special purpose authorities which included BBNPA (Bannau Brecheiniog National Park Authority). Councils have struggled with the basic concept of clarity on objectives, what would be achieved and being in receipt of the correct performance information to enable assessment of those achievements given the impact of the scarce resources available. Hope to cover any trends in detail within the National Summary, which would be published in the summer. There were complications with service delivery, however that did not get away from the part the Councils plays in complex service delivery, and having the correct measures to understand if services were delivered in the way recipients required them to be. There has been no consideration to extend to the 3 special purpose Authorities. The CEO thanked Audit Wales for the report, from an organisational perspective of moving forward and the Committee for the way it has received, considered the report, for comments and challenge to officers. The negative commentary within the report did not reflect the current operational practice, progress had been made in the intervening period. Data was just one source, the way to evaluate performance was to triangulate information, from the public, service users, from key performance information, County Councillors, complaints, compliments and various forums and Boards to test Senior Leaders understanding. Consideration would be given to good practice that emanated from the Audit Wales National Summary when published. Powys were using an RBA (Results Based Accountability framework) approach to the CESP Stronger Fairer Greener Plan. Cabinet Member for Finance and Corporate Services added that the report had generated negative comment, however there were positives. It had been identified that the Council had adopted changes to its performance reporting which had led to greater clarity. Reassurance was given, that advances had been made in regard to the information and data received and how this was reported and made available to Cabinet.
Background: The specific main issues identified in the report were: 1. A disjointed contract management process. 2. An absence of clear guidance that is supported by an effective training regime. 3. Slow collective response to indicators of financial concern. 4. The agility of the Project Bank Account (PBA) scheme 5. Unclear roles and responsibilities that includes effective collective administration and management. Contributing to those specific issues were wider behaviours such as: 1. Silo Approach - An inward focus on service specific parts of the project that allowed some tasks to drift or fail. 2. Optimism Bias – The Council were optimistic that the project would be delivered without any significant obstacles and so the importance of progressing the Project Bank Account diminished. 3. Ownership and Oversight – The hierarchy of governance was unclear and lacked a Senior Responsible Officer (SRO) with authority to have oversight for all aspects of the project. Director of Corporate Services: · The report shared with Committee reflected the contract management improvements. · Important to highlight, that whilst the project was ongoing and several years ago it was noted that contract management could be better across the organisation. · Substantive work has been undertaken around the 4 core themes. Commercial Performance and Risk Board:- o Focussed on supplier risk, monitoring the risk and inputting of mitigated actions against any identified risk. o Board has representation across all Services which is fundamental in ability to the breakdown of silos. o Extensive contract management training programme was in place and completed by a large proportion of managers. Project Bank Accounts: o In terms of Project Bank Accounts (PBA) management and implementation is quite difficult. Limited Banks that would participate, all LA’s were having similar issues. o Powys has been instrumental in requesting Welsh Government support with a group established to drive change and ease of the process for more banks to be involved. o When identified that the PBA was not in place, PCC should have done more to ensure that contractors were being paid. Questions were asked but evidence not sought therefore lessons have been learned. Supply Chain: o Supply Chain identification and risk was key. Systems and Processes: o Systems and processes being put in place in response to ongoing work but also picking up on the specifics of the recommendations of this report with some additional planned improvements highlighted in Section 5 of the report. o The Council has recognised concerns with actions undertaken with further work to be completed o An Action Plan which accompanied the Audit report, and the specific response will be monitored through the Commercial Performance and Risk Board. o Where concern had been raised in terms of the legality of spend, assurance given that the contract existed contract signed existed, both parties had signed up to the agreement and supply has been made to the council and any expenditure made in regard to this project is completely lawful. Chief Officer Place: The report highlighted a number of concerns of the management and administration of the contract, with particular focus as requested by the Committee on PBA’s. The concerns have been considered by a team of officers from Housing, Financial and Commercial and Legal Services, working with SWAP on a clear Action Plan to address and resolve concerns. Many of these actions have been or are due to be completed. Monitoring of current contracts within Housing Services for those that require PBA’s has been or is in process, notwithstanding that PBA’s may reduce but not eliminate risk. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: In the interim Head of Housing report there were differing figures in the final account £3.674m of which £3.540m had been paid by the Council The SWAP report it was noted that the Council paid a total of £3.684m between June 2021 and Feb 2023, which figure was correct. If the council had made payments up to 6th February 2023 if an invoice had been forwarded after that date, with no payment to RL Davies for that work would PCC be liable for payment. Committee Member commented that they were assured by the detailed review and pleased to see comprehensive actions in place with lessons learned. The Council should reflect on the financial damage to the sub-contractors, the Council’s main concern was to gain control of assets and completing the development, with little thought given to the sub-contractors. Whilst the Council has no legal liability, despite issues noted around contract management, this could have been mitigated by having the PBA in place, which the sub-contractors were led to believe was in place, monies would have been ringfenced and only paid to sub-contractors, if a PBA had been in place, in case of insolvency, payments would have been secured. A request for reimbursement of sub-contractors, in the absence of the PBA and the Council’s failure to implement sufficient controls and verify payments to sub-contractors was made. The difference between the two figures, the question on one of the reports was specific to the contract itself, where there was some additional payments related to material price uplift payment. The SWAP report picked up figure against the contract specifically hence the difference in figures. Payments after a specific date, when the Council make payments on work provided or goods supplied, timing of invoice would not necessarily dictate that, however when a company goes into Administration it would be dealt with through a separate process. In terms of the liability of the Council, clearly the supply was with the main contractor and there was no liability to pay further payments. PCC’s responsibility in terms of payment was with the main contractor, this would mean that PCC has no liability to the payment of sub-contractors, as not supplying the Council but the main contractor. Those sub-contractors would place any claims through the administration process. Chair requested that a paper be prepared for the Committee setting out in detail the Councils response to reimbursement or compensation payment to sub-contractors request Conclude what we should have done whilst not just the strictly legal bit. Monitoring Officer commented that PCC had not received a requests from contractors, the request for compensation was from Cllr Pete alone. Clarification sought if the request was endorsed by the Committee and not just Cllr Pete. Chair requested the legal position duties and obligations to sub-contractor would be set out, given absence of PBA, clearly stating why PCC cannot legally pay compensation and noting any limitations of PCC powers in that respect. Chair requested if there was a risk the SWAP report could be used in a legal case against the LA. Members in agreement for compensation to be reviewed as noted above were Cllrs: Pete Lewington, William Powell, Graham Breese, Gareth Ratcliffe, Co-opted Members Gareth Hall, John Brautigam. What changes had been implemented prior or following the Audit Report in terms of accountability, policies, procedures and processes. Changes to processes etc., have been summarised in the reports and set out further actions. Individual accountability questions were raised within the Senior Leadership Teams and would be followed through any internal process if required with HR, none had been identified. No detail in regard to any specific costs within the project only the overarching figures. Action:- To be followed up by Housing Services. In terms of accountability and lessons learned, all officers involved in this specific project, have undertaken Contract Management training, with further training scheduled by September 2024 on Prince 2.
Background: Committee acknowledged the reasons for the delay of the Information Governance (IG) report 2022/23 due to resource and work priorities. The 2023/24 should be available Summer or Autumn 2024, dependent on Committee programme timetabling. · The IG activities ensure that the Council understands how its information, not just personal information, was used with assurances provided to Cabinet of the appropriateness of such use. · The Council has an Information and Assurance Governance Plan, which was revised every 2 years. · Any elements outstanding were moved across onto the 2023-25. · Those elements out of timescales were nearing completion. · The Information Compliance Team, also support all of the LA’s schools. · Cyber Security and GDPR mandatory training, as discussed earlier, was seen by the ICO (Information Commissioners Office) as an important measure of compliance with the Data Protection Act, other relevant legislation and the policies of an organisation. · The report indicated an increased rate of staff compliance, with a reduction noted in Members compliance rate. However, the compliance rate for Members had increased since publication of the report · In term of Personal Data breaches, processes were in place to ensure there were reported, staff were comfortable with the reporting to the Information Compliance Team, so that the Council was in a position to manage and respond appropriately to a breach with notification made to the ICO and data subjects. · The Council did learn from incidents and breaches, to input any specific measure or mitigations, policy or training to prevent recurrence. · Incidents reported to the Information Compliance Team had increased, of which a number were determined to be personal data breaches. There was a difference between an incident and a Personal Data Breach. · Reduction in reports requiring ICO notification. · No complaints have been received from the ICO. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: When would the 2023-25 plan be implemented The 2023-25 plan has been agreed by the Corporate Information Governance Group (CIGG) in March of 2023. Elements that were outstanding (2021-23) had been incorporated into the 2023-25 plan. Only 51% of the previous plan had been implemented, was the 2023-25 therefore realistic. The 2023-25 plan has been revisited with the CIGG, due to changes in resource within the Information Compliance Team, to consider timescales and risk assess issues within the plan. Some elements may fall out of the plan, as deemed lower risk, however these would not be lost sight of. Was the Information Compliance Team adequately resourced to fulfil the statutory responsibilities of the Council There had been a turnover of staff within the last 2 years. Of the Information Compliance Officers in post only 1 has been in post more than 12 months. The staffing resource may be correct, however the knowledge and skills, within the team, still required time and support to develop with input from the managers within the team. A partial assurance rating was noted within the report, given the inexperience of staff within the team were matters better or worse. It has been a challenging year, however the management of the Electronic Information Officer, has provided scope to progress. The assurance rating would continue as partial, with the plan providing detail of where the Service was heading. Given that time would be required to train new staff there was some understanding why Subject Access Requests missed deadlines of 30-days, albeit this should be the exception rather than the rule, under legislation the deadline could be extended if the requestor were informed in writing, were there sufficient resource levels for this. The 30-day deadline was a requirement under the Data Protection Act, it could only be extended for further 2 months if the request were considered complex. Volume of workload would not be considered under the extension rule. Work continues within the team to apply exemption when appropriate and relevant. Was the number of FOI’s (Freedom of Information) requests comparative to other LA’s. There was no actual baselining against other LA’s exists as each LA could handle requests in a different manner, dependent on their IG Teams set up. When able to review, other LA’s have more requests than Powys. It would be helpful if the numbers of correspondence were to be included in appendix 2 for the Committee to understand the baseline for the LA and which Service Areas may be in receipt of above average requests. Work had begun in relation to sense check the impact and volume of e-mails issued in a year, against how many of those were misdirected. Were there specific reason why the LA consistently failed to meet compliance target of 81% with Cyber Security and GDPR mandatory training. The Monitoring Officer responded that the percentage within the report related to refresher training, with a note that Officers had previously completed training. The CEO has made it very clear that mandatory was exactly that mandatory. Going forward the LA will be meetings its requirement.
Background: The presentation was kindly provided to the Committee prior to the meeting. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: Were all controls in place, to reduce or mitigate against risk including that of human error. Whilst there may not be any regulatory action enforced by the ICO lessons are learned. We acknowledge the impact of breaches on any data subject and that of the Council’s reputation. Through training all Council employees and Members understand this was a whole organisation responsibility.
Background: Presentation slides provided to Committee following the meeting. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: To what extent was it prudent and current practice to share our approach and best practice to cyber security between Public Sector partners, Local Service Board. Within Wales there is the Warning and Advice Protocol (WARP) where the LA’s M&WWFA (Mid and West Wales Fire Authority) and National Park Associations who share information and good practice on a quarterly basis. Would agency staff receive the same level of training as permanent staff members. Short term and agency staff were in receipt of the same training level of training through E-learning as permanent staff, and in addition have access to the same awareness messages.
The Committee noted the reviewed Anti Money Laundering policy.
The Committee noted the reviewed Fraud Prosecutions and Sanctions Policy.
Background: · Treasury report quarterly update · Interest received at the end of Q3 stood at £900k · There was a significant amount of re-profiling for the Capital programme, at the end of Q3 it was reduced down to £80m from £96m reported in Q2. · The amount to be funded from borrowing decreased from 42% - 36%. · The Chart (3.21) shows how the PWLB rates have changed within year. · Some borrowing had to be replaced in Q3, as further borrowing was to be re-paid in Q4. Short term borrowing taken to finance the debt. · There was no substantial borrowing expected prior to the year end, resulting in less debt at the end of year as when year commenced. · Estimates for the financially costed revenue stream have been updated with sundry debt reduced slightly to £11.6m from £15m. · Collection rate for Council Tax and Non-Domestic Residence are equitable to last year. · Unrecovered VAT remains at £69k similar to end of Q2, with potential for 58k to still be recovered. Issues Raised by the Committee and Responses Received: Issues Raised by the Committee: Responses Received: The appendix to the report in relation to purchase cards, aware that there was activity planned with Internal Audit, and the establishment of a working group, however the situation surrounding purchase cards was not improving. Chair confirmed that the Committee could be assured of the high priority afforded and work was on-going. Due to the current financial situation, the report referred to potential project delays and reduced activity, with links to Capital Working Group report, Chair encouraged officers to apply clear, transparent, accessible criteria on which decisions would be made.
Background: Capital Working Group Final Report and Recommendations provided. The Committee agreed with the findings and Chair approved report to be forwarded to Cabinet for consideration and response. Whistleblowing Working Group has held its initial meeting which reviewed the draft ToR (Terms of Reference), awaiting approval from Legal Services. Next steps will be to review draft fictitious cases to test the governance framework.
Items to be considered at later meetings: Information Governance Plan 2023-25 Business continuity Annual complaint report to include Whistleblowing data and information.
Decision as recorded
RESOLVED to exclude the public for the following items of business on the grounds that there would be disclosure to them of exempt information under category 3 of The Local Authorities (Access to Information) (Variation) (Wales) Order 2007). The Monitoring Officer has determined that category 3 of the Access to Information Procedure Rules applies to the following items. His view on the public interest test (having taken account of the provisions of Rule 14.8 of the Council's Access to Information Rules) was that to make this information public would disclose information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information). These factors in his view outweigh the public interest in disclosing this information. Members are asked to consider these factors when determining the public interest test, which they must decide when considering excluding the public from this part of the meeting. Proposed By Member Cllr William Powell and Seconded By Member Cllr Chris Walsh
RESOLVED to exclude the public for the following items of business on the grounds that there would be disclosure to them of exempt information under category 3 of The Local Authorities (Access to Information) (Variation) (Wales) Order 2007). The Monitoring Officer has determined that category 3 of the Access to Information Procedure Rules applies to the following items. His view on the public interest test (having taken account of the provisions of Rule 14.8 of the Council's Access to Information Rules) was that to make this information public would disclose information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information). These factors in his view outweigh the public interest in disclosing this information. Members are asked to consider these factors when determining the public interest test, which they must decide when considering excluding the public from this part of the meeting. Proposed By Member Cllr William Powell and Seconded By Member Cllr Chris Walsh
Committee received an update on the Cyber Security Incident – Pony Teal.
Committee received a verbal update on Sustainable Powys.
Councillors must say when they have a personal link to something being discussed, such as a job, a property or a family member. A prejudicial interest is one strong enough that the councillor usually leaves the room and takes no part.
Declarations are read from the minutes once they are published.
Lists the council's current councillors only. Co-opted members, officers and former councillors aren't shown.