Internal and external auditors give Rutland County Council a clean bill of health

Internal and external audit times have given Rutland County Council a clean bill of health.

Various reports were discussed by the authority’s audit committee in Oakham last night (June 25), with no major issues flagged in any of the council’s departments or services.

Internal and external audits for the most recent year as well as in year audits were discussed, as well as an update on the external audit of the council’s most recent set of accounts.

On various occasions the council’s internal auditors, led by Rachel Ashley-Caunt, were praised and an external report into how the internal audit team carries out its duties also found the team to be carrying out its duties well.

Coun Raymond Payne (Lib Dem) said; “It is really good to hear and nice to know that as an authority we are in all the right places that we need to be. Particularly with local government reorganisation coming down the track, as it is crucial that we are firing on all cylinders in any negotiations. The stronger our financial position is, the more audit is, the more these figures stack up, the stronger we are going to be when it comes to the arm wrestling that is coming.”

The council is likely to end in 2028 and could merge with neighbouring authorities to form a larger unitary council. Once the final announcement is made by the government next year, the councils will have to join forces to merge their assets and debts and make a plan for how the combined services will operate.

Ms Ashley-Caunt said her team had started 30 per cent of the audits planned for this year and that 100 per cent of the audits planned in the previous year had taken place.

Her report said: “Since the last meeting of the Audit and Risk Committee, final reports have been issued in relation to the following audits: Registration Services, Savings and Transformation, Service user monies – appointeeships / deputyships, Continuing Healthcare – Adults, Building Control Partnership and Adult Safeguarding. All reports have given assurance opinions of at least Moderate Assurance. Advisory reports have also been issued in relation to Equalities, Diversity and Inclusion.”

However, unlike as is the practice in some authorities, the audit committee, which is chaired by independent councillor Kevin Corby, did not publish the internal audit reports along with the other papers.

According to external auditors Grant Thornton, the authority finance team, which is led by 151 officer Kirsty Nutton, is ahead of many other councils in getting its end of year accounts finished off. In recent years there has been a national audit and subsequent accounting problem which has led to many authorities not having accounts audited.

Helen Lillington, from Grant Thornton, said there were risks around the pension fund and building values, due to the estimation nature of the accounting.

Coun Payne asked what the risks were ahead of local government reorganisation.

The auditor said: “I think you’re in a really good position and all the reports we have talked about tonight, sort of reflect that.You’ve had internal audit reports that are essentially clean, which give you some assurance around some of those basics and fundamentals.”

She said across local government, auditors were ‘starting to see some of those basics of financial management start to creak at the edges’ as staff vacancies meant there was less scrutiny of the finances.

At the end of the meeting Coun Payne told Coun Corby: “I hope all meetings go as well as this, but I wouldn’t bet on it.”