The Chief Internal Auditor, Mark Niblock, introduced his report which identified and evaluated the performance of the Internal Audit Section and included four items of note arising from the actual work undertaken during the period 1 July to 31 August 2019. The items of note were:

·  Client Finance Support Unit

·  Mersey Pension Fund (MPF) – Civica Pensions5 Data Migration

·  Financial Regulations

·  ICT audit work to evaluate the effectiveness of controls in operation covering 3 key areas, namely:

o  GDPR compliance in schools

o  Business Continuity Planning – Crisis Communications;

o  Cyber Security Awareness

Details of audit work undertaken in these areas and actions arising were provided to the committee.

In response to Members’ questions Mark Niblock commented that a comprehensive forward plan had been prepared, which included lessons learned and this information would be picked up and reported to the Audit and Risk Management Committee in the course of his regular reporting. He added that this ongoing work involved clear action plans, stage points and timescales.

The Director of Finance and Investment, Shaer Halewood, confirmed that within the 2019/20 budget there were savings for Children’s Services which would come out of a restructure and these innovative changes to processes would contribute to the savings.

The Chief Internal Auditor concluded his report referring to a comprehensive list of internal audit activity over the reporting period attached at Appendix 1 to his report that detailed the audits completed, identifying opinions provided and a current BRAG rating indicating the current status of the report and progress being made by officers to address identified issues.

Resolved – That the report be noted.