Agenda item

To consider a report by the Monitoring Officer (copy enclosed) on the revisions to the Council’s strategy for the prevention and detection of fraud, corruption and bribery.

A report by the Monitoring Officer (MO), which detailed the revisions to the Council’s strategy for the prevention and detection of fraud, corruption and bribery, had been circulated previously.

The MO introduced the report which provided details of the updated strategy.  He explained that the Council employed large numbers of staff and spent many millions of pounds per year.  It commissioned and provided a wide range of services to individuals and households and worked with a wide range of private, public and voluntary sector organisations.

He referred to the ongoing risk of loss due to fraud and corruption from both internal and external sources.  There was also an ongoing risk of bribery as the Council provided and procured goods, works and services, and it had put in place proportionate systems to minimise this risk and these were kept under review.  The Council recognised that as well as causing financial loss, fraud and corruption was also detrimental to the provision of services and damaged the reputation of the Council and public bodies in general.

A draft Strategy, Appendix 1, had been included with the report.  The Policy had been a single lengthy document, however, a policy statement was now a single page at the beginning of the strategy document containing the main principles upon which the Council would approach fraud, bribery and corruption.  The Policy Statement and the procedures supporting it enabled the Council to provide a clear message that it would not tolerate any impropriety by employees, Elected Members or third party organisations.  Any Policy purporting to counter the threat of fraud and corruption was kept up to date and reviewed in light of new legislative, technological and professional developments. 

The Council's existing Anti-Fraud and Corruption Policy had been approved in 2006, and the revised draft strategy had taken into account changes to legislation brought about by the Bribery Act 2010.  The guidance included best practice guidance, such as the CIPFA Code of Practice on Managing the Risk of Fraud and Corruption.    

Although the Council had experienced a relatively low level of detected fraudulent activity in recent years it was most important that vigilance was maintained and that all employees, Elected Members and partners were aware of the risk of fraud and how to report concerns or suspicions.  The strategy provided clear advice as to how, and to whom, suspicions should be reported.  In addition there was a clear statement of the Council's commitment to taking robust enforcement action where illegal or corrupt activity was detected.

The CIPFA Code recommended that an organisation should acknowledge responsibility for ensuring that the risks of fraud and corruption were managed effectively, identify specific exposure to risk, develop a counter fraud strategy, provide resources to support that strategy and include policies to support the strategy.  The Council would continue to adapt and adopt a proactive approach to countering fraudulent activities and Internal Audit would undertake an annual review of the effectiveness of these controls.

The following points were raised by Mr P. Whitham and responses provided:-

-               The word “theft” had been  included in number 1 of the Policy Statement but not elsewhere. He suggested that it should either be omitted or included consistently.

-               Confirmation was provided that the assurance work pertaining to the annual risk assessment, referred to on page 15 of the report, would be undertaken by Internal Audit and this would then inform the Risk Register. 

-               The officers provided confirmation that details of the Policy would be included on the intranet, presented to SLT and incorporated in the induction training provided for members of staff.

Following further discussion, it was:-

RESOLVED – that the Committee recommends approval of the contents of the draft strategy, Appendix 1, for approval by Cabinet.

     (GW, LJ to Action)