-
Agenda and minutes
Venue: Council Chamber, Muriel Matters House, Breeds Place, Hastings, TN34 3UY. Please enter the building through the Contact Centre entrance via the seafront.
Contact: Democratic Services on 01424 451484 email: democraticservices@hastings.gov.uk
Items No. Item Apologies for absence
Minutes:
None received.
Declarations of interest
Minutes:
Councillor
Item
Interest
Cllr Webb
All items
Personal – Is an East
Sussex County
Councillor, Cabinet member 2021-2022
Cllr Marlow-Eastwood
All items
Personal – Is an East
Sussex County
Councillor
Minutes of the last meeting PDF 95 KB
Minutes:
RESOLVED – that the minutes of the meeting held on 9th November 2023 be approved as a true record.
External Auditor's Annual Report on Hastings Borough Council 2021/22 and 2022/23 PDF 117 KB
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Chief Finance Officer gave an introduction and highlighted that the report covers two financial years.
The External Auditor presented a report to summarise the principal matters arising because of the audit and assurance work carried out by the Councils External
Auditors Grant Thornton. The External Auditor highlighted that for financial sustainability there are significant weaknesses. The finance position is extremely challenging, and the reserves have had to be used. The planned savings for the two financial years was below 100% with 2021-22 being 82% delivered and in 2022-23 78% savings have placed a greater draw on reserves. The second significant weakness is regarding capital investments made. With regards to the Cornwallis Hotel development the External Auditor believes there was not good due diligence completed and that procurement rules were not followed. Regarding Governance the external Auditor highlighted issues in 2021 with internal audit. The improvement from bringing in Orbis should be seen going into 2023-24. It was highlighted that Cabinet review risk at an informal meeting and not a formal meeting and that this is a weakness. There are other elements that are completed at informal meetings, and this makes it unable to be scrutinised or audited. A Key recommendation is that the Council reviews its internal governance arrangements to ensure that business is formalised, and that scrutiny is then able to discharge its responsibilities.
Work is taking place now on the 2020-21 Financial statements. The Government is proposing a backstop and this could happen in March 2024 or September 2024. Because of this the 2021-22 and 2022-23 financial statements are not to be started. The reset would mean that the External Auditor would start in earnest on the 2023-24 financial statements audit and then undertake a programme of work to get assurance on the opening balances for 2023-24.
Twelve recommendations are made in the report. The committee asked questions.
The Chair invited Councillor Patmore (Chair of Overview and Scrutiny) to join the meeting.
Councillor Sinden asked what would happen to the financial statements for 2021-22 and 2023-24? The External Auditor answered this is being assessed and there are no clear answers yet.
Councillor Marlow Eastwood asked regarding Cornwallis Car Park redevelopment and at what level the serious errors were made? The External Auditor explained it was not at a junior level and was Senior Officers and Senior members through Cabinet at the time of the decision making.
Recommendation 1:
Councillor Collins asked regarding the savings and income targets not being met and if the budget targets should be raised? The Chief Finance Officer answered that there are now regular monitoring reports which should highlight where targets are not being achieved and give time to address them. By holding a budget planning meeting in December, it will give the Council a head start to achieve the budget targets.
Councillor Webb asked regarding the direction of travel for the risk identified
because of contract procedure breach. The External auditor agreed that the direction
of travel is a flat line rather ... view the full minutes text for item 9.
Notification of any additional urgent items (if any)
Minutes:
None
-
My council
Contact
Contact us if you have a question about democratic services.
Content
The content on this page is the responsibility of our Democratic Services team.