Issue - meetings

This report summarises progress against the Internal Audit Plan 2021-2022.

The Committee received a report summarising progress against the Internal Audit Plan 2021-2022.

The following matters were considered:

a)            Actions to address limited assurance reports. Following a question from a Member, the Internal Auditor informed the Committee that Officers were required to produce an action plan to address observations from internal audit reports. The Internal Auditor was content that the action plans produced by officers in response to the limited assurance reports were sufficient to address the matters identified and mitigate the future risk. The Internal Auditor assessed the target date and priority that had been given to actions and would follow them to completion.

b)            Assurance opinion on audit reports. Following a question from a Member, the Internal Auditor provided the Committee with a verbal summary of the nature of the assurance opinion issued on reports. It was noted that the assurance opinion related to the control framework in place and the appliance of those controls. The assurance opinion did not relate to the priority of the Audit or revisions to its due date.

c)            Future work plan for Internal Auditor. The Internal Auditor informed the Committee that she would discuss the future work plan with the Head of Corporate Assurance following the recent resignation of the Council’s Chief Executive. This would include whether any additional reports relating to corporate governance were required.

Following consideration, the Committee unanimously resolved to:

(1)      Note the internal audit progress report from Southern Internal Audit Partnership attached at Appendix 1 to the report.