Accounts Commission June 2026 public session

Jo Armstrong  0:08
Welcome to today's meeting of the Accounts Commission, which today is in Glasgow. The public session of today’s meeting is being recorded. The recording will be made available via the Accounts Commission's website as soon as possible and available on request in the interim.
Members of the public are also welcome to observe the public session of the Commission's meeting today. Those who are watching this morning, thanks for taking the time to join us. You are here, however, to observe and not participate, and therefore your camera and microphone are already off.
I'd particularly like to welcome representatives of both Clackmannanshire and Inverclyde councils, welcome, thank you for coming along today. And I don't think there are any other… two chief execs … council. 
Please note that the meeting chat function is not in use as we've had some fun and games in the past! Experience any technical issues, please contact our support colleagues separately via Teams or by e-mail to the address given in the calendar invite.
Commission members, please keep your camera on throughout the meeting, but keep your microphone on mute. For others participating in the meeting, please keep your camera off … except when it's your item. 
So that's the intro.
Apologies for absence, Sarah. 

Sarah Watters  1:29
We’ve had no apologies received today. 

Jo Armstrong  1:33
Declarations of interest. Can I ask members of any connection or interest regarding any items on today's agenda to please state the connection or interest and whether they consider it material enough to keep… to recuse themselves?
So I’ve got Carol?

Carol Evans
I'd like to declare that I work for a body that's audited by Deloitte, so I won't be participating in questioning for the Clackmannanshire session, but I will, we have taken evidence… taken advice and I can remain in the room.

Jo Armstrong
Derek.

Derek Yule
Yeah, it’s the item on Clackmannanshire as well, as a current resident of Clackmannanshire and I did used to work for the council, though it’s about 25 years ago. So I don't believe either factor contribute… I plan to participate fully in the debate.

Jo Armstrong
Jennifer.

Jennifer Henderson
I also work for a public body that has the same auditor and I am not participating in the public session but will be involved in the private session and I’ve taken advice and had its confirmed that that's okay.

Jo Armstrong
Angela.

Angela Leitch 
Yeah, and also on item 5, I previously was Chief Executive within Clackmannanshire, but it's over 15 years ago…

Jo Armstrong  2:44
Any other connections to be declared?
That takes us to item 3, order of business. As normal, I'd like to seek the Commission's approval of the order of business today. I propose that we consider items 10 to 18 in private for the reasons set out on the agenda. I'd also like to propose that we take item 13, where the Commission considers its response to the Clackmannanshire Council report, before item 11, Controller of Audit’s update report. Are members agreed?
Before we move on to the minutes, I'd also like to recognise that this is Andy Cowie's final meeting for the Commission. And I want to thank you, and I suspect your Commission members will also, for your contributions over that time period. Healthy challenge, robust challenge at times, but absolutely a really meaningful input to the Commission, including multiple performance audits and the Code of Audit Practice twice, so that's a fairly, that's a fairly big contribution. So, thanks, Andy, we will miss you in the future sessions, but we will have a chance to say our more, less formal thanks later in the year.
That takes us to item four, minutes and matters arising from the previous meeting.

Sarah Watters  4:01
Yeah, there were three matters that are still outstanding on the minute. There is a CIPFA/LASAAC effectiveness review ongoing at the moment. Some Audit Scotland officers are involved with that, but there isn't an opportunity at this point for us to feed into that review from a Commission and a Controller perspective. But we will have an opportunity through the local government code consultation later in the year. 
The Commission members had asked that we consider the positioning of audit and scrutiny. This was on the back of an update that Helena had provided on the scrutiny coordination group and we will consider that in more detail at our strategy seminar in September.
And just a reminder that Kenneth Lawrie and Emily Lynch from the Local Government Benchmarking Framework Board will come to the Commission in August and I will remind members nearer the time and you can indicate areas that you would like to explore with Kenneth and Emily when they come to the meeting.
They will also, we will in advance of that, we will be providing a paper on how councils have used the LGBF to drive continuous improvement. There are some examples went to the lo Local Government Benchmarking Framework Board last month, so we'll make sure that's circulated in advance of the meeting.

Jo Armstrong  5:18
Just to confirm, anybody got any queries around the minute or any errors or omissions need to be amended?
So we therefore agree, approve the minute.
Any follow-up questions for Sarah, on the tracker?
OK, thank you.
That takes us to item 5. One of the two substantive items on today's agenda, which is the section 102 report on this council, Clackmannanshire Council.
This is a statutory report by the Controller of Audit on the council. The report was produced following the 23/24 audit of the council. The Controller and the audit team are here to provide any clarifications or answers to questions that members may have on the Controller's report. We have about 35 minutes or so on this session. We'll then have a discussion with representatives of the council in our private session before we then consider in private later today how we wish to proceed. 
So Helena, I’ll open… that for you.

Helena Gray  6:26
Thank you and good morning everybody, and I welcome the opportunity to discuss my section 102 report on the delivery of the 23/24 audit at Clackmannanshire Council with the Commission today. 
As the Commission will know, the role of public audit is to provide independent assurance on how public money is being managed. It supports officers and elected members’ understanding of the organisation's financial and governance position, and reassures communities that public funds are being managed appropriately.
Timely audit delivery is critical. It ensures that those charged with governance can have confidence in the accuracy of the information on which they are basing their decisions. 
Recognising this, there are statutory deadlines for when councils must publish their audited accounts by. These timelines were relaxed in response to COVID and across the public sector, efforts continue to recover public audit to pre-pandemic timelines.
Most bodies have made good progress with improvements in the timeliness of finalising the audited accounts. Unfortunately, the position within Clackmannanshire Council has worsened, the timescales for the 23/24 audit slipping further away from the statutory deadlines rather than improving. 
My report sets out the reasons for this, including persistent capacity challenges within the council's finance team, highlighted by auditors over a number of years, and more recently, turnover within the external audit team. 
A successful audit is built upon partnership and I recognise that when an audit gets delayed, the audit timetable can clash with other important priorities for finance teams such as setting budgets, and other audit deadlines for audit teams. And I look forward to discussing these in more detail with the Commission and the efforts the council and the auditors have taken to address these issues.
I would add that these challenges are not unique to Clackmannanshire Council. The Commission has repeatedly reported on the workforce challenges facing councils and as I've reported elsewhere, when finance positions become vacant, it is proving challenging to recruit to fill them. And while my report focuses specifically on the challenges faced by Clackmannanshire given their acute nature, all councils should be considering how well-equipped they are to manage this risk.
I'll conclude by reiterating again why this matters, because it isn't simply about missing a deadline. Later this year, the council will be setting out the process for agreeing its 27/28 budget. Given the size of the financial challenges it faces, robust and timely information to inform decision making has never been so important.
It is concerning that, at present, it will be making these decisions based on a set of audited accounts from 23/24. The council and the auditor need to urgently agree and timeline for the delivery of the 24/25 and 25/26 audit, and that they both have the resources in place to ensure that that timetable can be met. Thank you.

Jo Armstrong  9:17
Thanks, Helena.
As is normally in our process, how we conduct ourselves is that we try to group questions to help facilitate the conversation. So to structure it, we've got four subject areas we're covering today. Governance, reporting and accountability, capacity and capability, external auditors, and future actions.
We start with questions around governance, reporting and accountability with the first question coming from Malcolm. 

Malcolm Bell  9:44
Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Controller, for the report. As Chair says, I'm interested in governance … the involvement of councillors, elected members. So I’d just like to get a flavour, firstly, of what your view is on how well-sighted members were on the delays and the impacts as, as they started to occur and went on, and I know it covers two councils, there was an election in between as well. 
And then following on from that, what actions did the council take to ensure that the members, again, touching on what you said in your opening remarks, what action did the council take to ensure the members were taking decisions based on reliable and robust financial information? 

Helena Gray  10:37
Thank you, and I'll bring in the audit team, I think, to share some of their observations based on their attendance at the audit and scrutiny meetings, as I know the issue of the delays to the audit was discussed at the audit and scrutiny committee at the time of the presentation of the draft annual audit report. So Stephen, I'll bring you in at this point.

Stephen Craig  10:58
Yeah, so as, as you say, there was a detailed debate and challenge to both the officers and ourselves around the preparation of the 23/24 accounts. The presentation that we put to the council in terms of our annual audit report, and a number of queries around capacity and the ability for the council and ourselves as auditors to deliver to that timetable. 
What I would say is there isn't a standing audit agenda item at audit and scrutiny committees on a sort of ongoing basis, so there hasn't been detailed discussions at each one around where the audit is. We attend, but we're very much attending in a listening mode on a regular basis. They did issue the statutory notice advising of the delays to the annual report, so that was put forward. But I think it would be helpful for the officers to discuss what conversations they've had in a private briefing in advance of those audit scrutiny committees in terms of what information is being provided to the council at that point.

Helena Gray  12:09
And then in terms of the preparation of the 26/27 budget, again, Stephen, I don't know if there's anything further that you would add, but I don't think that the delays to the audit were referenced in the budget papers themselves as the budget was presented, but I don't know if there's anything…

Stephen Craig 12:29
No, not that we were aware of in any of the conversations that we had.

Malcolm Bell  12:34
If I may, Chair… The impression I'm getting is that members were rather passive on this issue, is that reasonable?

Stephen Craig  12:47
I think they were fully, the members were fully engaged when the report was put forward. They were fully engaged in the review of the annual accounts when they were presented. I guess, as I said, from a factual perspective, there wasn't a standing agenda item at each audit and scrutiny committee to say, where are we in the timetable, what is happening? So we weren't asked to present in terms of any update on an ongoing basis. 

Malcolm Bell  13:14
In terms of a degree of curiosity around the members, talk of the members as opposed to the officers. It perhaps wasn't as…

Stephen Craig  13:25
Certainly not in asking ourselves as the audit team. As I say, I don't know what conversations were had directly between the members and the officers. I do apologise, I don't have sight on that.

Jo Armstrong  13:40
So there was no discussion about the impact that this might have on the veracity of budgeting this year or next, for example? 

Stephen Craig  13:50
There wasn't anything in the meeting that we attended, was there? That we’re aware of, no.

Jo Armstrong  13:56
I’m going to turn now to, unless there's any other questions, follow up questions on governance. I’ll turn now to capacity and capability, and I'm going to ask Mike. 

Michael Neilson  14:05
Thanks. Thank you for the report.
I'd just like to start with a … question. You mentioned in the introduction that the, that most authorities were improving, catching up, and this is not the case with Clackmannanshire. And I see from exhibit 1 that, the... there is no date for the submission of unaudited accounts for 24/25 yet. And I just wondered whether that is still the position?

Helena Gray  14:47
Again, I'll bring Stephen in, but as far as I'm aware, the indication is that the 24/25 annual accounts will be ready for audit towards the end of this year. But Stephen, you'll have more up-to-date information. 

Stephen Craig  15:00
So we've had a detailed sort of planning session with the team in terms of looking forward to the 24/25 accounts and the audit cycle. That meeting happened six weeks ago now, roughly? 
And key actions were taken on both sides to go away and really think through what the detailed timetable could look like, how we can accelerate certain work streams whilst the annual accounts are being finalised so that we're not waiting until they are fully completed. And that timetable is therefore going to be kicking off in July. But I think a full and final version of the draft accounts for audit, their officers are still working through exactly when they will be prepared and presented.
I agree, it's likely to be towards, certainly post-summer. 

Michael Neilson  15:56
So the slippage in presentation of the unaudited accounts is another, at least five or six months later than last year, later than in respect to 23/24.
... In your accounts, you establish, you state that there's a sound framework for, in relation to best value. How do you assess the performance in relation to the accounts in that context, to get to that conclusion?

Helena Gray  16:34
So I'll bring Stephen and Rebbecca in, but I think it is important to recognise, I think that both things can be true in terms of that best value and then highlighting concerns. 
So I think in terms of that best value judgement, it is important to recognise the progress that the council has made in implementing the recommendations from my 2024 best value report, and the annual audit highlights that out of 8 recommendations, 3 of those are now complete, including the development of a medium term financial strategy, actions to strengthen the role of the audit and scrutiny committee, and then the implementation of that framework for setting and monitoring the capital budget. But as my report and the annual report also highlights, the council's arrangements for financial management are designed and implemented appropriately, but there are obviously points made around the timeliness of financial reporting. 
So I think both can be true. It's not a binary assessment of best value. But again, I'll bring in Stephen and Rebbecca. 

Rebbecca McConnachie  17:39
Yeah, so in terms of, echo what Helena has said already. In the financial management conclusion, we obviously refer to control recommendations and other factors raised throughout our report.
There is a specific paragraph on the effectiveness of the finance function and the concerns we have in relation to that as a result of the capacity issues that the council has faced over a number of years.

Michael Neilson  18:03
This is exactly on that. Capacity in relation to the council, as opposed to the... your own, which is not for me. Is capacity essentially the issue?

Rebbecca McConnachie  18:23
There’s obviously a range of issues that we identified throughout the report, but capacity is a root cause that has been identified throughout many years for the council, despite the actions that the council has taken to try and remedy that. So yes, capacity is one of the root causes that we would attribute …
… that have occurred over a number of years, and obviously it's not just ourselves that have been appointed auditors in that time, there has been others as well.

Jo Armstrong  18:54
Just to clarify then, so the quality and accuracy issues you highlight in the report, you would say is directly related to that or is there some other reason? 

Stephen Craig  19:03
I think the capacity is the underlying factor behind what comes through. We all know if people have a number of things on their desk, on their priority list, on their to-do list, it can get squeezed in terms of what the output is and therefore I think the capacity is the underlying root cause.

Jo Armstrong  19:24
…questions on… Angela.

Angela Leitch  19:28
Can I ask then, following on from Mike’s question, what confidence the Commission could take in the medium term financial plan when we don't have …

Helena Gray  19:43
[Whispers:} Do you want to come in on that? [Laughter]

Jo Armstrong  19:46
One of you, please, please speak up. I think it's probably a Deloitte issue, but yeah. 

Stephen Craig  19:51
So, we understand a range of different things that the council are putting in place. So clearly we are looking primarily within our responsibility at the look back in the historical financial statements and clearly our key priority and our focus is around assisting in the project management and bringing that up to speed in terms of the 24/25 accounts and then and then ongoing. 
In terms of what the council are doing in terms of presenting the outturn reports to the council, that's clearly on track and has happened at the last audit and scrutiny meeting. So it's not that the members don't have information, it's just they don't have finalised audited information to base their look, outlook on. 
From a medium-term perspective. They spend a lot of time talking about and discussing that. So I think from that medium term financial planning, I think there is confidence around what they're doing and how they're doing it. But clearly there is a clear focus on ensuring we catch back up with the audit cycle.

Helena Gray  20:58
Yeah, I mean, I think I'd highlight again, obviously it's an unmodified audit opinion and the annual audit report highlights the auditor's views around effective financial management.
So I think as Stephen said, those processes are in, are in place and there is that regular budget monitoring. I think the point that I was highlighting is, in my opening remarks, is that that is, that is based on unaudited accounts for the most, for the most recent…
And that, that's clearly the point that I was highlighting of concern, but in terms of those processes around financial management, the auditors have highlighted that those are…

Derek Yule  21:43
I'm slightly confused, I would have to say, so apologies for maybe coming back, just asking, I think it's maybe picking up on Jo's point. Am I right in what you're saying is that the staff turnover or inability to retain staff within the council is the major reason for the delays? Because what I read in your annual audit report talked about the movement from the, what you were provided with from the council, a number of adjustments that had to be made which challenge the accuracy of the information that you were given. 
Now, I'm not convinced that that's a capacity issue, or is it? That's what I'm trying to tease out, because I'm not sure the replies you've given give me the confidence that there's... a competency issue, as well as a... capacity issue. So it would be helpful if you could clarify that.

Helena Gray  22:39
I think, and again, I’ll bring in Stephen and Rebbecca, but I suppose it's difficult to identify one single factor because they are all inter-related, I think, in terms of the delays. As set out in my report, there are a number of issues at play.
I think as we've highlighted, the capacity challenges are not new. They've been highlighted by auditors over a number of times, a number of reports. But the council has taken steps to try and manage and mitigate those and we recognise that it is a challenging labour market recruitment context out there. 
But I think as Stephen has highlighted, there's a point where capacity can then play into quality and accuracy as well. Again, the team might want to talk a bit more about some of the quality aspects that have been highlighted in the annual audit report. And I suppose what I'd highlight is in the annual audit report, there are 7 indicators which the auditors highlight as sort of that quality and I suppose readiness, I think, for audit. 
I think between the 22/23 and 23/24 audit, a number of those indicators have, so three out of those seven have worsened. I think, and again, the team might want to talk a little bit more about the detail behind their assessments in those indicators. But I suppose my overriding reflection would be, it's very difficult, I think, to separate out all, you know, what one individual factor might have been at play. I think there are a number of factors that have influenced this.

Stephen Craig  24:20
I'll let Rebbecca talk a little bit to the detail, but just I guess just echo to try and clarify from my perspective what I was trying to convey to yourselves is the capacity piece has meant there are been a number of key roles that have been vacant. So with a number of key roles vacant, you don't always have the full suite of the right people in the right place to do the right, the right things. So that then does speak to some of the inaccuracies in the reporting that we highlight in our, in our annual report. 
But I think it does, I know it's intertwined, but I think it does come down to that they didn't have the whole team in place for the whole time and different people coming in and out and therefore to me that's why I bring it back to the capacity piece. 
If you want to talk to some of the detail.

Rebbecca McConnachie  25:06
Yeah, I mean, you'll see from the annual audit report we had adjustments over PPE, particularly in relation to valuations, and we also worked through adjustments around pensions, so a few specialist areas, and so we supported the council as much as we could, while respecting our own independence as auditors, we supported them through those challenges, those areas and processed them through the accounts. 
So, we obviously identify the errors, communicate them, and then ask officers to correct them, but we work proactively with them, as much as possible within our remit, to achieve the, the expectations that we …

Derek Yule  25:46
Fair to say those are, the two areas you mentioned are an issue for, I think every council.

Jo Armstrong  25:55
I'm going to just follow up slightly on that and … for what we're going to be doing later is the extent to which the section 95 officer has been actively asking for additional resource to create the capacity that you suggested is potentially a problem or potentially leads to the inaccuracies that you've received. Has, are you aware of that…?

Stephen Craig  26:19
So, yes, I think would be the simple answer, to the extent I don't capture all the detail, Rebbecca can help me. But they have gone through a very detailed, bottoms-up, what exactly does the size and the shape of the team need to look like, look like? So they have put that down on paper and saying this is the structure that the finance function needs to, needs to be.
They have had recruitment into some of the new roles that have been created. In certain circumstances people have pulled out before even joining. So whilst there is the structure and the vision for what the finance function is, the recruitment and the retention into that continues to be problematic for them.

Jo Armstrong  27:05
Not without the want of trying, it’s still not, still not resolved.
Takes us then into external auditors. Derek.

Derek Yule  27:15
Thanks, Jo. 
I take the point that some of these issues kind of overlap with one another, but we've spoken a lot about capacity, so what I'd like is to just kind of change direction on that. We’ve spoken about the capacity within the council. I think it, and I think it's, Helena, it’s section 24 to 27 of the report talks about availability of the audit team.
I was drawn, like Mike, to exhibit 1, which shows the time or delays in the council providing an unaudited set of accounts to auditors, and then the time it’s taken from that point to get the audit completed. And that seems to be where there's been the biggest delay created. 
So I wonder if you could say about, a bit about the audit team. I appreciate that you took on responsibility part way through this period. But in terms of the sort of approach from yourselves in terms of the audit team, your own capacity. Which, because I think one specific point is made that there was three different appointment leads over that period, and you've acknowledged that the turnover within audit team resulted in an increase in time taken with repeated questions going back to the… So I wonder if I could tease that a bit more to understand what extent of delay came about with, from the audit side rather, because I think that paragraph quite naturally starts off by saying that responsibility for the completion of audit is a shared responsibility. So just trying to understand the capacity issues within Deloitte as part of that.

Helena Gray  28:59
Yeah, I'll bring you in, but I think, as you say, it isn't, it's an interrelate, you know, it's a partnership and it's a complex relation… relationship to untangle, but Stephen, I'll bring you in. 

Stephen Craig  29:13
Yeah, look, a good audit is predicated on high-quality timely information coming from a management team, and then a well-planned, well-executed audit process coming from ourselves as auditors leading through that. 
When there are delays to the timetable and there are points within the accounts or the information that we have to go back and forth on, that clearly impacts
ourselves. So from an overall capacity perspective, I wouldn't say that Deloitte have a capacity issue in terms of being able to staff the audit. I've got high confidence that we've got the right level of capacity. Where we find challenges, whenever the timelines are reset, reimagined, the team that I have booked and scheduled are often then scheduled to be doing something else. So in terms of keeping a continuity through that, that becomes very challenging from my perspective. We schedule our teams 12 months in advance. So whenever there's slippage through, that becomes, it becomes, it does become challenging. 
New people are picking things up, are never going to be as efficient as the same person completing a task from start to finish, and there will undoubtedly therefore be repeat, repeat queries. So I think we have acknowledged that there is clearly an impact on the overall timetable, but it stems from the timetable not being met in the first instance, in my view. 
You mentioned three different lead changes. The first one happened before this process kicked off. So our first lead did do the 22/23, but retired from the firm before 23/24 started. So my predecessor did present the audit plan for the 23/24 audit.
Unfortunately, given the delays that were collectively encountered, his capacity and his ability to see that through were impacted. So he had to rotate off because he'd moved to a different part of the business and a different function, therefore unable to complete, which is why I've come in.

Helena Gray  31:20
But just to say, you might want to say a bit about the team as well, so there's been continuity as part of the team.

Rebbecca McConnachie  31:29
Yeah, so I have been on the Clackmannanshire audit for 23/24 from start to finish to varying degrees. So I have been present throughout the audit process.
The team, obviously, we have a variety of individuals, you know, from trainee to manager, some with local government experience or wider public sector experience, some without, as we operate a mixed market model and that works well for our other public sector engagements.
So although there was changes in team, it was, as Stephen described, as a result of the changing timeline and we did strive wherever possible to obtain continuity where that was, was there. 
But on the whole, we do have enough capacity and we have plans in place in terms of delivery of future audits. So we have staff booked currently from July through to April for the majority of that time in order to try, if possible, to return the timeline to normal.

Derek Yule  32:32
No, that's really helpful, and I suppose what I'm picking up from that is the importance of having a timetable that's adhered to, because your capacity as orders, as auditors to deliver that audit is dependent on the council meeting its commitment, and vice versa.

Jo Armstrong  32:49
Can I just follow up? Because clarity around when you reset a timeline. How is that signed off and how many times have you had to go back and reset the timeline?

Rebbecca McConnachie  33:03
Initial timeline outlined in the audit plan would have been beginning the audit in November of 2024. The accounts were not delivered until January 2025, so that was six week… eight week reset initially, so quite significant. And then we commenced the audit in January. Through budget time, we did have to pare back some of the audit team as the council took on that priority, and then we were asked at the end of…

Jo Armstrong  33:37
So they prioritised budgeting over the audit.

Rebbecca McConnachie  33:40
And then we were asked in April 2025 to take a break again, as the delivery … and then we restarted again in July 25, and again, that sort of series … that was managed through meetings with the section 95 officer, which were held on a weekly basis throughout the audit period to facilitate communication. And where possible we worked with the council to, you know, change the areas we were working on or prioritise requests or anything that we could do that was possible … we absolutely did try to do to try and keep the audit moving, you know, maybe just not in a particular area where the council was struggling with in terms of capacity or prioritisation.

Jo Armstrong  34:30
Again, important for later, the extent to which a timeline that's set is a timeline that's then delivered is something we would probably want to question. Because it hasn't, that's not the track record at the moment. OK.

Derek Yule  34:45
I suppose a follow up on that. Budget happens every year, so that's a known factor. So, I would have expected the council to have anticipated that in terms of the timescale, would mean that it would have to resources onto the budget. 
I just wanted one sort of follow-up question. When the council is not delivering to the agreed timescale, was that escalated within the council by yourselves and how was that escalation process? Or were you simply working with the finance team?

Stephen Craig  35:24
It was predominantly with the finance team, in fairness. 

Rebbecca McConnachie  35:27
Yeah, so the section 95 officer was present at the meeting, where we’d discuss the timeline to delivery over whether the council was going to be able to meet the request we required within the next week or two weeks, and then we did some horizon scanning. If it was clear that the council was unable to deliver within those periods, we would say we will have to, you know, pull our team off, in the spirit of efficiency for both sides, to give the council time to deliver the information required. And that was ongoing. 
And I know that it was escalated further via the section 95, but we were in weekly communication with the section 95 and we were quite clear they articulate the dependables and for us to continue the audit following …

Derek Yule  36:16
I'm a bit surprised or curious if you were working directly with the section… which would be the obvious point of contact for the conduct of the audit. If you were finding an ongoing issue of deadlines being missed, information not being provided, why did you not escalate it within the council, to say you wouldn't be able to complete the audit within your timescales with these difficulties?

Helena Gray  36:44
I'll probably jump in at this point. And the Commission will obviously be aware that as part of the Commission's own response framework, I was taking steps to escalate both the auditors’ concerns as well as the Commission's concerns as well, which included a meeting with the chief exec of the council and the auditor in June last year to discuss a number of issues, including audit delivery, and then at various points throughout the period, requesting updates from, joint updates from both the section 95 officer and the audit team around the up-to-date timelines. 
Now, there were obviously, that moved a number of times, so in July, I received an update on the shared plan of completing the audit by September 2025. In early September, I was then indicate, received an update that that would not be possible due to outstanding queries. 
And then in December I was updated that the intention was to sign in January, and then in January I was updated that the intention was to sign in March. So I suppose alongside the steps that the auditors had taken, you'll be aware that on the Commission's behalf as well, I was escalating these issues as well.

Derek Yule  38:04
In a sense, trying to understand that escalation process was largely through yourself monitoring progress or lack of progress, Helena, rather than… 

Helena Gray  38:12
Well, requesting that together the auditor and the section 95 officer keep me and then the Commission up to date on how timelines were moving. 

Derek Yule  38:20
Thanks.

Jo Armstrong  38:21
Just, so the challenge back would be, you've been asking too many questions, you've been repeating the questions and that's just adding burden to the already probably very tight team. To what extent has there, is there veracity to that statement or that belief? 

Stephen Craig  38:36
So we absolutely tried to keep any, any such repeat or follow-up questions to a minimum based on the information that we had.
As I said, there were some changes in the underlying team and therefore there were some follow-up queries that would have been repeating information that had been received, but wasn't fully complete, wasn't fully thought through, and therefore we just need, we needed Further information in order to complete our work.
So yes, it will have contributed. I don't think it is the primary contributing…

Jo Armstrong  39:12
What proportion do you think it would have contributed to the delays?

Stephen Craig  39:20
Very hard to say given the point at which I came in at, quite, quite near the end.

Jo Armstrong  39:27
I’ll maybe be a bit naughty then and Rebbecca, you've been in this process the whole way through, the extent to which the questions that have come back have been legitimate questions or because somebody hadn't, was more, trying to get up to speed with the issues that rather than actually taking the evidence that had been presented, to what extent has that been significant in the delay as opposed to, yes, there were additional questions but were not significant enough to create the delays that we've got here?

Rebbecca McConnachie  39:53
They're definitely not significant enough to create the delays we've got here.
In, the, there is questions in an audit process and as an entity, the council needs to be able to service both the accounts and audit queries throughout, as well as its important routine business.
Some of the duplicate requests were built in to address issues from the previous year audit and also from issues arising as well within PPE valuations for example. So there will be a number of requests, for example, for a fixed asset register that reconciles to the accounts because there was a number of changes there. So you can't quantify the level of requests that were due to change in team members as they are mixed within a complex picture of the … areas of delay.

Jo Armstrong  40:44
Andy.

Andrew Cowie  40:45
Can I have a follow-up question? I’m simple, it's down to my understanding, not your articulation.
You’ve mentioned that there's been a number of adjustments to the timeline. The Controller mentioned about adjustments to the timeline, June, July, end of the year. If the timeline was a credible timeline and the answers that were coming back to the audit team were sufficiently articulated, there would have been no change to the timeline, would be my planning assumption. 
So I'm struggling to get my head round why the timeline was adjusted two or three times if the information was not significantly wrong or invalid or had to be tested. Because that to me sounds like, no, it did have a significant impact, otherwise you'd have lived up to the timeline.
Does that make sense, as a question?

Stephen Craig  41:43
Yes.
So I guess in thinking that and thinking that through.
When the information was coming through, not always was the information complete, or required additional work which Rebbecca summarised around, around items like PPE. And I don't want to just pick on one item, but as an example and it's pulled out in our reports, it's probably the valid example. 
In terms of the accounts took longer than expected and more work had to go into updating the accounts for the comments and the volume of the comments that came through from ourselves. So that took a lot longer than the expected timetable took.
So yes, the queries and our points for adjustments did contribute to the overall timetable slippage because it took more work on the council's behalf. 
So it’s the, I guess it's still, there's a little bit of an intertwination between the, between those two.

Andrew Cowie  42:46
Thank you.

Jo Armstrong  42:47
Derek.

Derek Yule  42:48
No.

Jo Armstrong  42:49
You’re OK. Christine is it significant?

Christine Lester  42:52
It's just a quick follow-up as to Helena actually. It was just in the extent, when you were going through this process, what was the proactivity? Was it, were you getting the updates or were you going to have to ask for the updates?

Helena Gray  43:05
Gosh, casting my mind back a bit. 

Christine Lester  43:08
Or was it a mixture?

Helena Gray  43:09
I think it was a mixture, to be honest, in terms of originally of requesting the joint meeting and then an update being provided to me, requesting that that update in terms of planning be provided. And then when those dates moved, it was a mixture of either me asking out of curiosity or a proactive update, I couldn't say definitively either way, I think it's a mixture.

Jo Armstrong  43:38
OK, if there's nothing else under the external auditors, we now move on to the final section of this session which is the future actions. Andrew. 

Andrew Burns  43:47
Thanks, Jo, and thanks, Helena, for the report. I mean, as Jo's indicated, I'm going to ask a couple of questions around future actions. But as I ask those questions, I'm sort of acutely aware of the wider context that all 32 local authorities financially face in Scotland. And they’re under significant financial pressures, not to mention the day-to-day challenges that all councils face in an annual sort of calendar year. 
That said, though, you know, acknowledging those challenges, you know this, as Controller of Audit, and we as the Accounts Commission have got a responsibility to ensure that timely accounts are secured and indeed councils have got a statutory duty to ensure that counts… accounts are secured. And I've been on the Commission for 8 years now. I think for 5 of those 8 years, Clackmannanshire hasn't delivered its accounts on time. And the position has been getting worse, as far as I can see from the information that's before me, as those years have gone on, those last five years. 
So, you know, it does concern me greatly that that's the position that we're in, acknowledging all the pressures that the local authority is under. I understand those pressures, I really do. 
But we have to press on this, we really do. And I know you understand that deeply as well as Controller of Audit. So I do want to sort of seek, whether it's from yourself or from Stephen or Rebbecca as the auditors, a bit more detail about what immediate actions have been taken to ensure improvement, because in paragraph 34 of your report, in the conclusion section, you do mention that the auditor and the council
now need to come forward with an agreed timeline for 24/25 and 25/26. 
Can you give us any update on, has that now happened? Is it happening? I mean, I know some of this has been covered in the questions already, but I think it's really crucial we get absolute clarity about this going forward. 

Helena Gray  45:35
I'll bring in Stephen and Rebbecca to talk about the plan, but just to reiterate, I suppose the point that you've made, I absolutely agree that this is about now both the auditor and the council agreeing a timetable that they can both stick to and that they're both confident that they've got the resources in place to deliver that timetable.
So I'll bring in Stephen and Rebbecca. And I think the other thing to highlight is obviously lessons have, there have been exercises to reflect on the lessons and be proactive in that space. So Stephen and Rebbecca, do you want to say a bit about the timetable, but also the lessons learned exercise as well?

Stephen Craig  46:15
So as I noted, we met about … ago with the team, both my team and the council’s team in order to proactively, but in a positive manner, think about what had happened through, not just 23/24, but predominantly focused on 23/24 and how we closed out the audit and the audit process. 
That was a, as I say, a positive forward-looking, which is not trying to say,
did, he said she said, it'd say, right, okay, that didn't work, so how do we do it better now going forward? And we had a really good and engaged session around ways of working and how to take that forward. 
As I said, some of the key actions out of that, actions on our side, some actions on the finance team side. One of the key ones is the formation of that timetable. We have a call next Tuesday now, I believe, it's in the diary for to do that follow-up and to start nailing down what that timetable is and ensuring that is a realistic timetable for both ourselves and the council to meet.
Rebbecca has mentioned, we do have staff booked now from July through to April. Hoping it doesn't take that length of time, but if it doesn't we’ll very quickly move into 25/26. 
What we have sought to do is have a smaller team for longer, to try and mirror what the council has in terms of the number of people. We've talked about being out on site. So we're sat there in the same room working with them. I'm slightly old-school as well, I actually like to see people rather than be on a telephone. So we've talked about things like that in terms of ways of working, and ensuring that with a smaller team, there's that continuity element throughout. So there shouldn't be some of these areas where there might be repeat questions or a lack of knowledge or understanding. 
We've also talked about getting access to their system, Tech One. So they're going to give us a demo and sort of a teaching so we can be a little bit more proactive in helping ourselves in terms of finding some of the evidence and the information to also try and relieve some of the capacity concerns from the council perspective. So, we've explored a number of ways of getting it back on track, but we acknowledge that it's not, it’s not going to be easy, it's going to take hard work and it's going to take additional effort when we think around some of the new things that are coming in for the 24/25 financial year, such as some of the new accounting standards.

Andrew Burns  48:57
Thanks very much. Thanks, Jo. If I could just follow up a little bit. I mean, that's really helpful, Stephen, and it's promising to hear all of that, and I hope it does come to fruition along the timelines you've outlined. 
I mean, I guess if there's any further assurances that you can give us about how this will be followed up, I know this is touched on in the very final paragraph of the covering report, Helena. Any further assurances you can give us about how this will be followed up through the subsequent annual audit processes and what actions you'll take as Controller of Audit to keep us as the Commission informed of what's developing, hopefully along the lines that Stephen and Rebbecca have outlined to us this morning. 
Because all that we want as a Commission is for Clackmannanshire to get back on track, that's our main aim here, along with the other 27, 28 councils that are on track. That's all we want. It's a simple request, but we do need some reassurance that it's actually going to happen now, given the track record over the last five years. 

Helena Gray  49:52
I mean, as the Commission will be aware, I report to the Commission regularly on delivery across outstanding audits, and I know that we'll continue to stay in close contact to see how the 24/25 audit progresses and as part of my wider reporting on delivery, I'll of course be bringing that back to the Commission and escalating again if there are any concerns, using the Commission's own response, response framework. 

Andrew Burns  50:20
Thanks very much. Thanks chair.

Jo Armstrong  50:22
Derek.

Derek Yule  50:23
Yeah, so just a quick, just to follow up. I mean, I like what I hear in terms of having an agreed timetable… what assumptions have gone into that planning in terms of capacity? For example, does it assume that the council will fill vacant posts or does it assume that the current staffing levels will say the same? So I suppose, just trying to tease out, in a different way, what assurances the Commission can take that this will get back on track. You've outlined a number of actions that you've taken, which is fine, but I just wondered what the risk elements of that are in terms of availability of staff. 

Helena Gray  50:58
Yeah, I mean, I don't know the extent to which that's been covered at this point in the conversations, but obviously it's something that the team, teams will need to work on. I think obviously it'll be for the council to provide that assurances to you as well. 
But I think absolutely the point I suppose I was making before and just to reiterate is, when coming up with that time… shared timetable, it's important that it is based on a shared understanding of the resources that need to be in place and when, and then a shared commitment about ensuring that, that they are in place. And then I suppose as inevitably if something comes up, you know, we shouldn't, we must recognise that there are always unplanned things, but then there is a shared conversation around how to respond and get back on track, as well.

Jo Armstrong  51:53
Can I ask Stephen, the extent to which lessons learned, you might now be a bit more proactive about speaking to the chief exec, or indeed the council leader, given ultimately they’re responsible for delivery, and you’re getting, not getting what you need from the section 95 officer?

Stephen Craig  52:10
Uh, it's a fair point, one that I'll take forward.

Jo Armstrong  52:15
And the extent to which, dare I say it, monthly monitoring might be required. I really don't want to go there because that's not our role. I really don't want this to keep going backwards as it seems to be inevitable. What would be the thinking around how would we keep, you keep Controller of Audit up to date with what's happening and the extent to which there might be early warning signs that things are not getting back on track?

Stephen Craig  52:40
I'm happy to take away an action to work out what would be the most, I guess, efficient and effective way of doing that. I'm very happy…

Jo Armstrong  52:49
Ultimately you're the auditor, you're not delivering, so I… and we are not delivering solutions here, but it's about giving us clarity and assurance that they are back on track and they are doing what they say they were going to do. 

Helena Gray  53:00
Yeah, I mean, I think we hear loud and clear that the Commission is keen to be kept up to date on how the 24/25 and 25/26 audit progresses and I’m absolutely happy to work with the auditor and the Commission to agree how that can best be done. 

Jo Armstrong  53:17
And my final one would be around the extent to which you've got, you will at the end of a set period - tell me the date - clarity around the delivery of 24/25 and 25/26.

Helena Gray  53:29
So I mean, I think they are obviously intertwined, but I think that it is really important that as part of the planning, that it's not just about 24/25, but it does encompass, you know, what those assumptions are for 25/26 as well, absolutely.

Jo Armstrong  53:45
Any other questions for…?
I appreciate the difficulties, I understand the complexities and am keen to look forward, not backwards. So let's, let’s assume that we will get back on track, but we will be hearing relatively soon and very frequently, I suspect, that that is indeed what's happening here.
Thank you very much. We will no doubt have more discussions later on in the day. Thank you.
Item 6.
The local government policy update. Joe.

Joe Chapman  54:40
Thank you very much, Chair. I will keep it brief, but just a couple of updates on a couple of items that were discussed at the last month's meeting. One was around the Mull campus. 
The First Minister said to Parliament last week that the Scottish Government is going to look at potentially a different funding model for that, for Argyll and Bute Council, if that gives them more flexibility. And that was after discussion around the example of Barra and Vatersay, which had been pulled out of the learning estate improvement programme. 
And Argyll and Bute Council had said that the, that programme restricted them to a like-for-like replacement, which limited their options. So, the government is looking at kind of giving the council more flexibility on that, which appears a positive development. 
Quick update on the Aberdeen hydrogen project that was also discussed last week. We have been liaising with the auditor on that and we'll be able to provide members with a little bit more background information on that from, from the audit perspective next week. 
And just a quick note to say that Parliament and Government, obviously formation has continued, the committee has been formed, the remits of the Cabinet Secretary for Local Government and for the Local Government and Social Justice Committee have been confirmed and they're aligned. They're very kind of brief about local government. It's local government, local government finance, local governance, which I guess gives flexibility to cover any issues in those areas that come up. And obviously, that's alongside the other aspects, particularly of the committee’s remit.
That's all I wanted to update on. Happy to take any questions.

Jo Armstrong  56:17
Questions for, questions for Joe?

Derek Yule  56:22
[Really good report, really helpful.]

Jo Armstrong  56:25
Thank you. Thanks for that.
Takes us to item 7, Chair’s update.
A number of items I just want to kind of just flag up what we’ve been doing in our spare time. 
The Auditor General and I went to a session with Orkney Council … wider than Orkney Council - Orkney Council, Health Board and IJB to explore opportunities and challenges and the extent to which the audit process may or may not be an impediment to allowing what changes they might want to implement. 
It was a very strange session because we were on Teams looking at a blank screen. They could see us, but we were looking at a blank screen. So it was a bit disconcerting. But we got a very good response. 
Stephen and I were both very clear about the challenges, the financial challenges and the need to do things. And the reality being that audit will not stop radical change if that's what they want. In fact, audit will look at those who are not doing what's needed. So I thought, I think it was a, it ran for longer than anticipated, so that suggests it was of interest. 
Andrew and I went to the local government reception with the MSPs. Again, interesting to meet some of the new, some of the new MSPs. And, you know, their interest in Audit Scotland, the Accounts Commission was there, so that's …
I attended a roundtable on the digital leadership yesterday with Alison and Mike, more just to get an understanding of the extent to which that leadership challenge is something we can help support or unblock blockages. So I think it was a useful session, Alison, yeah, Mike, yeah.
Just gives us, gives us a, I mean, there was three or four chief execs in the room who were supportive of the local government office, which I thought was an interesting. 

Mike Neilson  58:26
I think it gave us a good picture of, the sort of, the mindset of… and also of the, of the challenges, and the degree of, the degree of recognition of the opportunity, the real opportunities there in the context of …

Jo Armstrong  58:47
Recruitment update. Final planning meeting was yesterday, so we're launching on the 13th of July and I'm going to be asking everybody in the room to think about how we make sure our LinkedIn presence is improved and launched, because I think that's how we're going to get real interest in getting new members to join. 
And then finally, I'm going to hand over to Andrew, Andy, Christine, to talk about Aberdeenshire and Angus Council meetings.

Andrew Burns  59:14
Thanks very much, Jo. I mean, I’ll maybe take them in reverse order. I had a lucky week last week because I got two very positive visits to go on. And thanks to Jennifer and Derek for accompanying me to Forfar for Angus Council's follow up visit. And Christine and Andy for a visit to Aberdeenshire, which I learned is the only council in Scotland that doesn't have its head office in its council area, because that was in Aberdeen. 
But taking them in reverse order, I mean, I won't dwell on Angus. It was a very positive report, as colleagues will recall, from a couple of weeks ago, and the visit was equally constructive, I think it's fair to say. And there was a very good dialogue between the senior management team, the senior politicians. It was noteworthy they had administration and opposition politicians at the meeting, which was a good template to see, and it was a very constructive and positive discussion. So all good in Forfar, and thanks to Joe and other colleagues for his support. 
And Joe was also with us in Aberdeenshire, when Christine and Andy came along with me, and again, a very constructive visit, Jo, which had senior politicians, senior officers involved in a good further two-way dialogue. There was a subsequent meeting after a lunch break, I think it was, primarily focused around what was a very significant turnaround financially, if I put it like that, the position of the IJB. I think I’m right in saying, without being 100% correct on the exact figures, they've turned a sort of £26 million deficit in one year to the next year to a £1.5 million deficit, which is really quite something.
And they talked us through, in what was quite a short, one hour session, around some of the issues that they've done to achieve that. I know that Christine was particularly keen, given her interest in IJBs, to potentially follow that up and I think that I think, Chair, that would be a good idea. 

Christine Lester  1:01:01
They were really keen to offer.

Jo Armstrong  1:01:03
I also think maybe somebody from PABV team would value that too, yes. So I think that's sensible. 

Andrew Burns  1:01:08
I think maybe one of either, probably Malcolm, given he's geographically up there, but Malcolm or Carol or myself, as we'll see later on today, the sponsors for the social care performance audit, it would make sense if Malcolm maybe joined Christine and Carol if she's free, with an officer from PABV just to follow it up before Christine departs these shores in December. 

Christine Lester  1:01:29
They were very generous in their offer. 

Jo Armstrong  1:01:31
That’s good. No, I think definitely take that up…

Christine Leste  1:01:33
…explaining the processes that they’d gone through.

Jo Armstrong  1:01:34
They’ve done that turnaround, it’s definitely worthy of understanding what they’ve done. 

Andrew Burns  1:01:37
Because there might be some lessons that are applicable elsewhere. 

Jo Armstrong  1:01:39
Absolutely. 

Andrew Burns  1:01:40
So 2 very good visits, Jo, and thanks to everybody for their help in supporting me with them.

Andrew Cowie  1:01:47
A couple of things that kind of stood out for me from Aberdeenshire, and I have to confess that, a register of interest, I was brought up speaking Doric, so I actually felt very at home there!
But one was, you know, we're constantly looking to see where outliers, both bad and good performance are, to see what the rest of Scotland can maybe learn from that and bother the pride. 
And I think, you know, the chief executive summed it up, and Joe’s got it in the report, that they've gone about their business quietly, competently, and with their communities. But they've probably undersold what they've actually done. And that IJB turnaround, as the vice chair’s mentioned.
And the other thing that came out - and we were encouraging them to obviously share more around that - but the other thing that came out was their way of looking at things from a place perspective. But not just to, you know, satisfy statutory requirements, to meaningfully engage, so they've actually got a track record of redistributing pupils as the demographic changes come in, which have actually landed far better than they have in other areas. So I thought that was interesting.
They were pushing us to think in the future around what does audit look, place-based, system-wide, rather than just local authority, because that's how they're starting to construct stuff, you know, community ownership and all that. So I thought that was quite an interesting area of debate with them and something worthy of kind of following up, what does place-based audit look like? And I know Audit Scotland colleagues are looking at that, but I think that's probably a direction of strategic travel that’s worth considering.

Jo Armstrong  1:03:27
Certainly, given the desire with the Scottish Government, the CPP relaunch, if you like, clearly a need for… yeah.
Any other questions for…?
You went further afield!
Right, I think that brings us to the end of the private session, the public session. 

Sarah Watters   1:03:52
No, just a break, just a short break. 

Jo Armstrong  1:03:55
Please don't press any end event buttons. I’ve got it in red here! Starred and in red! 
OK, so I think we've got a 10 minute break? Back here at…

Sarah Watters  1:04:06
Just after quarter past.

Jo Armstrong  1:04:08
OK. Thank you.

---Break---

Jo Armstrong  1:04:10
…back, this is a, today's item 8, is best value, Inverclyde.
This is a statutory report by again the Controller of Audit, on best value on Inverclyde Council. The report draws attention to the findings from the council's 24/25 annual audit on how effectively it demonstrates best value.
The Commission is invited to consider and endorse the Controller's report in this session. We will then consider in private later today how we wish to proceed. The Controller and the auditor are here to provide any clarifications or answers to questions that members may have from the Controller's report and the annual audit as it relates to best value. So I'm going to hand over to Helena.

Helena Gray  1:04:54
Thank you and good morning again everybody. I welcome the opportunity to discuss my report on best value in Inverclyde Council with the Commission today and I'm joined by Michael and Taimoor and I thank them and the audit, the rest of the audit team for all of their work on the audit. 
As my report highlights, the council continues to demonstrate a commitment to best value with auditors reporting good progress overall against previous recommendations.
Auditors report that the council has effective leadership and governance arrangements in place, has outlined its strategic priorities and supports the delivery of these through more detailed plans, which also include key performance indicators and targets. The council has a sound performance management framework, which includes 40 performance indicators against three strategic priorities.
21 of these are on or above target and 14 are below target. Looking at comparative performance indicators, my report highlights that Inverclyde Council is in a strong position. Nationally, the council ranks third out of all 32 councils for indicators in the top two indicators and performs above the family group average, ranking in the top two for both area-based and population-based comparisons.
Auditors have concluded that the council has appropriate arrangements for financial management, but like many councils, it needs to identify further savings and/or income generation measures to bridge the funding gap in the future. Estimates at December 2025 indicated a forecast gap to 27/28 of 11.1 million, with already agreed savings taken into account.
The council has a good track record of delivering savings and its transformation programme is embedded within its wider plans and strategies. The council has identified specific projects with detailed anticipated costs and benefits. And auditors have also highlighted good engagement with communities both on the budget and transformation.
But the scale of the savings identified are not sufficient to … further work is therefore required to identify further savings and/or income generation opportunities to avoid unsustainable draws on …
I’ll pause there, but the team and I are very happy to take any further questions.

Jo Armstrong  1:07:11
Thanks, Helena. As again, as usual, we have an approach to following up. A variety of questions under headings of finances, transformation, interestingly on this one on shared services, governance and strategy. 
Can I ask Jennifer to lead off on finances?

Jennifer Henderson  1:07:33
Thank you, Helena. So, I’m picking up finances and Derek is going to, I know, come in, but I wanted to pick up, Helena, on the savings delivery, because it was, it struck me in the report, and there were lots of… probably the first thing to say is lots to like in the report, lots of things where I was sort of ticking off the things you'd hope to see. One of the things that really struck me was the council had managed to deliver almost all of its target savings and we don't always see that. We sometimes see a narrative that says they set a savings plan and actually then they couldn't deliver all the savings and they needed to pull more on reserves.
So I was just interested whether there's any lessons learned from that, that, how does the council achieve success in that area? And then specifically whether we know anything about, when the council set its savings plan out, were those the actual things that it ended up taking the savings in, or is it almost just a coincidence that the amount of money they could save, they had to pull on other things? So how much did they have to adapt the savings plan to still hit the number? 
Because I guess I'm really interested in whether there are lessons learned for other councils in how to approach that process of setting savings targets and then ensuring you deliver them. 
And just while I'm on it, I think, I want to say, really pleased to see the kind of budget consultation engagement. I think in the transformation work I've been involved in, we've definitely said councils need to consult with their communities about where they're planning on taking savings and getting people on board. So I'd be interested if any of that contributed to the success. 
Sorry, that was a multi-part question, Helena, but yeah, just what underpins the success in delivering their savings is the key question.

Helena Gray  1:09:12
Thanks. Now, I'll bring in Michael because he might want to say a little bit more about that process for setting savings and monitoring savings, I suppose, as well. But just to kick off, as you've highlighted, they do have that good track record of delivering savings, and then they have those arrangements in place to monitor savings.
I suppose I would observe, all councils, I think, take different approaches to how they set savings. And obviously, there's also a question around the level of ambition as well. So the more ambitious you might be in terms of the levels of savings, the harder they might be to actually monitor and deliver. So I think when we think about
savings, I think we can take comfort where there is a good track record in delivering the savings and they're contributing to a forecast closing of a funding gap that we expect that they might, if they've got that track record, you can take some assurance that they'll deliver on it. 
But as I've highlighted, there is more that they need to do. So I think, you know, it will be interesting as they look to their ambition for future savings, the extent to which they have that same confidence, I suppose, as to whether they're going to be able to deliver them as well. 
But like you say, I think it's, they have those processes in place to monitor delivery.
Michael, I don't know if you want to say a little bit more about it.

Michael Wilkie  1:10:36
Just one observation on why perhaps why they're achieved would be that when the council sets its budget, including savings, that's a 2-yearly process. So the detail is 2 years of detail, 3 years look ahead in the finance strategy and 10 years medium-term financial plan. 
But my observation is that in the two-year window, the savings identified are specific and detailed, and that, you know, they are very specific items, not an allocation to a service level or to a directorate to be achieved, perhaps to be identified and followed through, but specific items.

Jennifer Henderson  1:11:17
And so my hypothesis that yeah, they are, they took the savings against the things they planned to take the savings against rather than, as you've described, some councils would just say, it's this service that needs to find a saving and then when they can't, we have to balance the books somewhere else. That's really interesting.
Can I move on then to a question about reserves, I suppose? Because the other thing that helps with the balancing of the books is the drawing on reserves, and I note in your report, Helena, the council has obviously used reserves, plans to use reserves in the future, and I just wonder if you can sort of give a bit more of a view around sustainability of that approach and the strategy that sits behind the plan to use reserves and just to sort of expand on that a bit, because I know it's something we've commentated on often, the ongoing use of reserves could be a potential problem.

Helena Gray  1:12:08
Absolutely. So as you've highlighted, the council has used reserves, but the fact that that is in line with their reserves strategy. So it has a commitment to a minimum uncommitted general fund balance of 4 million or 2% and as at March 2025, at the end of March 2025, they sat at 4.4 million, so within their reserves strategy, and that, that 2% is a figure that we've seen across a number of councils as well. And the council's total usable level of reserves has remained relatively stable following a period where it did increase. 
As you'd expect me to, though, highlight that, you know, the council plans to bridge future gaps through a mixture of savings and reserves. And as I said in my introduction, it needs to think very carefully about how it intends to use those reserves going forward. 
I believe a review of the reserves policy was undertaken this year. That's part of a triennial review. And an amendment was made to the reserves policy at that time to ensure that when reserves are used during the budget-setting process, there is a plan to be put in place to reduce the reliance on reserves when balancing the revenue budget. So I think there is that, within that reserves policy, that recognition that that the reserves isn't a sustainable, using reserves must be done sustainably, I suppose, is what I'd say. 
But Michael, Taimoor, I don't know if you've got anything to add.

Michael Wilkie  1:13:42
Just the observation that the use of reserves has reduced as a trend in recent years as well.

Jennifer Henderson  1:13:47
Really helpful. Thank you.
I think other colleagues will pick up on other finance aspects. 

Derek Yule  1:13:55
You’d be disappointed if I didn’t! [Laughter]
A couple of totally unrelated questions. Could I just say first of all I thought this was a really good report and I think the council’s to be congratulated. I think those of us who have been around local government for more years than we care to remember can remember when the best value legislation first came out and the challenges the council faced at that stage. So I think it's a really good progress and really good to receive this report. 
I was curious about capital and I think obviously when we receive these reports on individual councils, what I picked up from Inverclyde was it seemed to be quite different from most, if not all other councils in Scotland. Different in a couple of senses. 
One, their proportion of revenue budget that’s going to meet borrowing costs is quite high compared to the national average, which I think is around about 6%. So that presents a challenge in itself to the council.
Equally, the paragraph in the report talks about the majority of the capital programme being financed by grant. I think elsewhere we're seeing most councils trying to offset the reduction in government grant by increasing borrowing. So Inverclyde seems to be doing things quite different in that sense. So I'd be interested to know a bit more about, is that a deliberate strategy by the council, recognising the challenges its revenue budget is facing and looking to use government grants as much as anything to cover capital? 
And I suppose that maybe there’s a follow up to that in the sense that, well, the implication of that is maybe… they don’t have as much resource to capital as it might like to do to meet the council's requirements. 

Helena Gray  1:15:38
So I'll bring the team in to talk a bit more about the approach to capital, but as you've highlighted, in my report I do highlight that it has relatively high finance costs. You're absolutely right. The average is 6% and I think Inverclyde is sitting at 8% finance costs. 
I do think it's important to highlight that this is an improving position. I think its base year within the local government benchmarking framework was 12.5%. But I'll bring in the team to talk a bit about that approach to financing capital.

Michael Wilkie  1:16:14
I guess the, my observation would be that the council is aware of its borrowing costs, in the review of its Treasury management strategy, and the borrowing costs are incorporated into its medium-term financial planning, including the expected refinancing or need to increase or, increase borrowing going forward. So it's recognised and incorporated in budgets, which I suppose is as much as we've considered. 

Derek Yule  1:16:41
Has it had to reduce its capital spend if it's relying on government grants? Because I think, I'm just conscious of the report we just issued that showed I think about a 15% reduction in capital grant across Scotland. If the council is not increasing borrowing to compensate for that, is that going to have a service implication going forward?

Michael Wilkie  1:17:02
I don't think I can answer that. Whether the council has done that or not. 

Derek Yule  1:17:07
OK, no that’s, that’s fine.
Second, totally unrelated…
Sorry Mike.

Michael Neilson  1:17:13
On capital. I think it’s the first, in my experience, where the council has actually spent its capital programme as planned. And I note what Derek is saying. The question is, is that because they've actually got a much more modest programme, because they've actually, it's an example of good practice in, in actually bringing the thing in in line with the plans?

Michael Wilkie  1:17:43
Maybe somewhat anecdotal, but I think that to the extent that it has significant capital grants, there’s a small number of projects which should be either delivered or reflected, and we've made some recommendations about the need to monitor slippage on those.
And in the remaining capital programme, the council appears to have been able to accelerate other projects where a project is slipping in order to still deliver the spend in year, whether it was on the intended project or not.

Jo Armstrong  1:18:14
It's capital spend rather than outcomes. They’ve delivered their capital spend, but may or may not have delivered on outcomes. 

Michael Wilkie  1:18:20
…expected project in the year… 

Helena Gray  1:18:22
…reprioritised. 

Jo Armstrong  1:18:23
No, no, that's fine. That's good. OK, thank you.
Derek.

Derek Yule  1:18:26
Thanks, chair.
Exhibit 2 and note 2. This is just curiosity as much as anything.
When the government introduced the council tax freeze again in 24/25, Inverclyde went out on a limb in terms of not accepting the grant funding and opting for a council tax increase. I think the note you've got, Helena, is what I understood, the government subsequently provided a one-off grant that council tax bills were using.
So I suppose a couple of questions fall out of that. What impact did that have on the council's financial projections going forward? And I assume its council tax base was quite different than what it might have been. Were there any lessons learned? Was there an admin burden associated with that? What was the feedback from residents? And would the council take a different direction again?
I don’t expect you to answer the last one!
[Laughter]

Helena Gray  1:19:28
I don’t think we'll be able to answer the last one. I'm not sure that we'll be able to answer about the admin burden, and I suppose the resident feedback on it as well, but I don't know if the team have got more detail on, I suppose, how council tax is factored in to the medium-term financial strategy in particular. 

Michael Wilkie  1:19:46
Yeah, that would, they, so the council has in its medium-term financial planning assumed council tax increases. Therefore, ultimately, whether grant funded or a council tax increase, I don't believe it had a significant impact in terms of where the source of funds was coming from in terms of its then underlying financial decisions.

Helena Gray  1:20:10
But I think the level of council tax for Band D in Inverclyde in 26/27 will be above the national average as well.

Derek Yule  1:20:23
That’s something because one of the criticisms of the council tax freeze is that it diluted the council tax base. If they got the 8.5% through, their base will have gone up and helped for future years, but I was just kind of looking for confirmation.
OK, thanks.

Jo Armstrong  1:20:39
OK? Thanks, Derek. Any other questions on finances?
Takes us into transformation and Andrew.

Andrew Burns  1:20:53
Thanks Jo. Thanks Helena, Michael, and Taimoor, for the suite of reports that are before us this morning on Inverclyde. And I think, as other colleagues have already said, I think overall this is a pretty positive report, and I think the senior management team and elected members should be congratulated for the overall outcome that's before us this morning.
I mean, particularly when you look at the key facts section, Helena, in your covering report, and consider that they've got 44, you know, not shy of 50% of all the zones within the 20% of most deprived areas in Scotland within Inverclyde. 
Against that context, and also when you look at, back, I don't know how they've managed this, the last full BV was 2017, how has that happened? That's 9 years ago!
But when you look back at the 2017 last full BV report, the progress has been pretty considerable. So overall, as I say, a very good report. 
I just had one query though on the transformation programme and you've already referenced in response to questions from Jennifer and Derek and others on finance about the importance of the transformation programme and its delivery. They've got a good track record of delivery in the past. 
But the section, I think it's paragraph 37 to 51 of the covering report, goes into a bit more detail, and paragraph 44 in particular picks up the fact that there isn't a specific programme manager or programme staff and that it's really just regular day-to-day staff that are responsible for the delivery of the projects. Obviously, that's worked to some extent, very effectively in the past, but just given the financial gap and challenge that you outlined in your opening remarks, I wonder if you could give us any update on how that is likely to progress or change in the future? I don't know if maybe Michael or Taimoor will have any more information on whether there's potentially going to be a change in approach given the sort of dependency on the transformation programme for balancing the budget.

Helena Gray  1:22:44
I’ll bring the team in. I suppose I'd observe though that, as you'll be aware, when we looked at the transformation work across the sector, actually, a number of, different councils took different approaches in terms of whether having a standalone transformation programme or embedding it within their council plan and their strategic priorities. And I think very clearly we didn't highlight actually that one approach is better than the other. Actually, it's a matter of choice. 
But what's important is being able to demonstrate a clear oversight, clear governance and a clear understanding of the benefits that transformation is expected to realise. And within my report, I highlight that all of those things are in place within that integrated into business as usual approach. 
But I suppose as you've highlighted, the risk that that does present is that the transformation and activity is happening embedded within the service levels and it's those staff that are embedded. So again, that's an opportunity, but also it carries a risk that we highlight. 
I think, and the team might want to say a bit more about this, you know, the council has identified a number of risks as part of its corporate risk register that relate to its transformation objectives, and that includes insufficient use of, of resources, along with other risks around technology, assets and facilities. So I think it's clearly recognised as a risk that they are actively looking to mitigate and manage. 

Andrew Burns  1:24:26
Thanks.
 
Helena Gray  1:24:27
Michael, I don’t know if you’ve anything?
 
Michael Wilkie  1:24:28
I would, only to highlight that we did reflect that the council has change boards at directorate level, and, as part of digital modernisation, it has the digital modernisation and transformation board, which effectively is an element of senior oversight and it's chaired by the Chief Executive.

Andrew Burns  1:24:48
OK, well that's all helpful. Thanks very much. Thanks, Jo, that was all I had. 

Jo Armstrong  1:24:54
Andy, do you want to…?

Andrew Cowie  1:24:56
Andrew stole my question that I’d prepared for! [Laughter] I'm having to adjust with some agility here. 
I think that's probably a metaphor for a smaller council as well. It has to be fairly agile, doesn't it, to deal with the full range of statutory requirements. So I think, you know, it's a very good report, thank you for writing it. But the subject matter is very positive as well. 
And I suppose it's just picking up the point around how do you deal with transformation as a smaller organisation, is one of the kind of safety valves is that sickness absence rate. Because if you're asking people to run faster, doing business as usual and transformation, then there's a toll in hours or stress, etcetera. So I didn't pick up in the report around any comment around sickness absence, but what's the trend in the organisation? Could you give us a bit of insight around that? 
My second point, which is hopefully the agile one, which is around… One of the points I think you make in the annual audit report, which is around suggesting that a quantified savings and income generation plan should now be generated, good up to now, but to get into a 10 year medium strategy, which is actually probably double the length of other organisations which have a five year medium term, this is a 10 year one, but you were suggesting that they should move on to having more detailed reports beyond the next two years, which is something I think we would welcome. So have they got the capacity to actually do that or is that just an aspiration by auditors? 
Do those two questions make sense? 

Helena Gray  1:26:34
So I think, so, I don't know…

Andrew Cowie  1:26:36
You can blame him for stealing!
[Laughter]

Helena Gray  1:26:38
I'm not sure we have to hand information on absence. I was just having a look to see whether, it's certainly not highlighted, I suppose, as part of the key messages of the BV workforce work that we undertook. 
But I don't know if the team have more to say on that. In terms of the savings and the capacity, I think, as you've highlighted, the council has a 10 year medium term financial strategy, but that is in terms of looking at savings and budgets they also look at the, look at the immediate in terms of a budget for three years and the savings plans for two, and I think that that point that we were making earlier is how to then build on that, and then look further. And to that transformation point and think about actually, as we look at the medium-term financial strategy, what are the actions that are going to close that longer term gap?
I think it's about ambition and looking further. I’ll bring in the team to talk a bit more about the capacity point though.

Michael Wilkie  1:27:48
Yes, we've absolutely recognised in our annual audit report, the medium-term financial planning, and officers accepted the recommendation to consider aligned savings plans in the same term. We've not yet seen those. The recommendation due date is December 26.
On the basis that it's been accepted in our discussions, I don't have any particular concerns about their capacity to develop the plans.

Andrew Cowie  1:28:16
Super, thank you.
 
Jo Armstrong  1:28:20
Is there anything else you want to pick up on transformation? No. Any other questions on transformation before we move on? 

Andrew Burns  1:28:24
No, that’s fine for me, thanks. 

Jo Armstrong  1:28:26
That takes us to shared services, which I found interesting, what's happening given our desire for people to at least consider shared services. That seems to be something worthy of investigating a bit further. Derek. 

Derek Yule  1:28:41
Yeah, thanks. I mean, that was the first point I was going to say, and I suppose, as Jo said, it is a line that the Commission has been looking, encouraging councils to look at opportunities for shared services, part of that need for substantial transformative change to help address the budget challenges going forward. 
So I'm interested, particularly sort of paragraph 47 of the report, the council's moved away from shared service arrangement and you've outlined the relationship it had with West Dunbartonshire. I was quite interested to know more about why the council embarked on it in the first place, and maybe, where we are now, particularly more interested in why it's moved away from it again. What were the reasons behind that, and are there any lessons that the Commission needs to take on board in terms of the rest of Scotland? 
Because it does sound as if the council has actually done quite a bit in terms of shared services and has now felt that's not the, the answer, so it'd be interesting to know more about that.

Helena Gray  1:29:39
Again, I’ll bring the team in, but I think it's important to highlight that there are examples of partnership working and there are particular examples in relation to joint funding arrangements to support activities to tackle child poverty. So it's not that the partnership working isn't happening. But as you've highlighted, the auditors have highlighted that the council has moved away from its shared service arrangement with West Dunbartonshire. 
I think actually it's important to recognise when a shared service arrangement might not be working, actually. And I think, you know, shared service arrangements have to be good shared service arrangements and deliver those benefits. And it was an independent evaluation of the West Dumbartonshire shared service that both of the councils commissioned and then on the back of, decided to move away. 
I think that report recognised that there was a genuine effort to forge a working relationship, but that there were significant barriers to growth and development, and a sense that it was now no longer offering value for money, and in part
was threatening local resilience of those, of those services. 
I think in terms of the barriers cited, I think they are the barriers that the Commission will be aware of, are frequently raised when it comes to sort of barriers around shared services. So, you know, perceived threats of loss of control, overstretched working schedules. And I think, again, bring the team in, they might have more to add, but as a result of that, it was felt that the model was not sustainable and it wasn't evidencing that it was delivering clear, clear benefits. 
But as I say, I think it's important to be able to move away from a shared service arrangement if it's not, if it doesn't feel like it's delivering value for money.

Michael Wilkie  1:31:41
My observations from the shared service that was dissolved was that the independent report reflected that not all the partners initially expected to join the shared service joined. So from the outset, it was not the intended necessarily breadth of shared service across multiple local authorities, and that it became more of a voluntary arrangement than it might have otherwise, rather than a very formal structured shared service.
And then to a degree, it then became shared management service rather than frontline service, whether that was the intention or not. And the benefits did arise from that shared management service, but it was largely on information sharing and sharing of those few posts, which is why it wasn't necessarily delivering the benefit, my reading, that it would have been expected to, and those post holders were therefore somewhat stretched. 
Maybe one of the barriers that is also worth highlighting is that they were not geographically close local authorities. So in terms of the specific frontline service, it is more challenging to be genuinely shared, and there was a recognition that sharing back office services might be a better investment in, so effort and time. 
I would also highlight that it did retain part of the shared service, the councils, despite the recommendation from the report to consider stopping all of the shared service, and that was the internal audit element. So the internal audit element has continued. The council, I believe, is currently in the process of considering and continuing or extending that arrangement.

Derek Yule  1:33:14
It's not necessarily meant as a criticism, as such. I'm just more trying to understand sort of the reasoning behind it and whether we can reflect upon that for sort of wider use across Scotland. OK, thank you. 

Jo Armstrong  1:33:28
I suspect there's definitely merit in understanding a bit more behind what was intended, what happened and why it didn't work because I do think if we're, continuing to suggest that's a model, we need to understand what works, what doesn't work. 

Michael Wilkie  1:33:45
I think the council did recognise there were elements that worked and benefit, and benefit that would continue through the close working of the individuals involved, but that it didn't necessarily merit the shared service model and the ongoing monitoring of that as an arrangement.

Jo Armstrong  1:34:00
Definitely worthy of some sort of follow-up somewhere along the way, Helena.

Helena Gray  1:34:04
Yeah, so I think, as you know, the Improvement Service have looked at case studies of shared services before. I'm not sure whether this was one that, one they picked up, but it might be of interest.

Jo Armstrong  1:34:16
Anything else on shared services?

Malcolm Bell  1:34:21
I think most of it has been covered, I guess, and I mean I absolutely agree with what you're saying that if a shared service isn’t working … for the sake of it. But is the council actively considering any future collaboration and how will it do this, if it is?

Helena Gray  1:34:41
I don’t know…

Michael Wilkie  1:34:43
I could only reference the current consideration around the internal audit shared service and slight expansion of that.

Jo Armstrong   1:34:56
Anything around the legal structure of two or three or four councils trying to join up to do something like this? Does that, is that an impediment?

Michael Wilkie  1:35:06
I'm not sure if the report reflected it as an impediment, but it did observe that there was a perception that if one council was benefiting, another was...

Jo Armstrong  1:35:16
OK. All right. Interesting. Interesting.
I think that then takes us to performance. Carol.

Carol Evans 1:35:25
Thank you. So again, thank you very much for the report. It's really nice to see such a positive report. It was good reading. And my question is on the performance, so it's really good to see that 59% are in the top 2 quartiles.
For the ones declining though, other than the things affecting all councils at the moment, are there any specific reasons for the decline or is it more to do with the fact that they prioritised the performing ones and deprioritised the declining ones? So that's my first question. 
And my second question is, again, with such a positive report, I was quite surprised that the satisfaction measured had gone down, you know, 91%. But again, apart from the factors that are affecting all councils and declining satisfaction across the board with council services, is there anything specific here that we should be aware of? 

Helena Gray  1:36:17
Yeah, thanks. I'm not sure that we've delved into the detail to understand whether there were particular factors that were affecting those changes, but I’ll let the team come in. 
I think in terms of the question around priorities, though, I suppose I’d point back to the council's own 40 indicators that reflect their three strategic priorities. And they actually, they monitor those against a 1-year and then a 5-year trend, looking at those 40 indicators, so they can see that performance over time. And against that 5-year trend, 23 of their 40 indicators are improving and 12 are declining.
But those, and then 3 are showing no change. Of those 12, they're actually evenly split. So 4-4-4 for their people, performance and place. So I would say that they are, you know, and those are their priority indicators. So I don't think you could point to one particular area that was, that was struggling. It's not like all of the 12 declining were in one, were in people or place. So I think it's just a reflection, I suppose, of the challenges rather than anything else. 
I don't know if there's any more?

Michael Wilkie  1:37:34
Nothing I would add.

Jo Armstrong  1:37:38
Anything else on…

Carol Evans  1:37:39
And satisfaction…?

Helena Gray  1:37:41
Again, I'm not sure that we've got enough detail to be able to say whether there's anything specific that's been, that's been driving that, other than as you've already reflected on the wider context.

Jo Armstrong  1:37:54
OK. Any other questions? Mike.

Michael Neilson  1:37:56
Thanks very much, and like others, an excellent report on an excellent performing, very well performing council. And for me, the combination of 40, having 40% of areas in the bottom quartile and being the third best performer on the overall indicators is, on the face of it, a fairly remarkable outcome. 
Given the economic background, I note that economic development is one of the areas where performance is actually, relative performance has fallen. Is there anything more you can say about that? 
And just a footnote to the shared services stuff, I thought, I felt the alarm bell in relation to, you know, it was going to be an elephant that turned into a cat in terms of the scale of the thing, because some original participants didn't stay in. It feels like one of the really important things to develop confidence in collaboration of all sorts, notably from my perspective, in digital.
That's from the other question.

Helena Gray  1:39:20
Yeah, so I think going back to the local economic development indicators, I suppose I would highlight that I think the indicators are from 23/24 and 24/25 data. So they're obviously not going to reflect the most up-to-date data. So I think it's 25/26 in the local government benchmarking framework, the indicators will be available from August. 
But I think if you delve into them in a bit more detail, you can see actually that it's the nature of the economic activity that I think is important. So the proportion earning less than the real living wage is higher than both the family group and Scottish group averages. But the GVA per capita is lower than the family group and Scottish group average. 
In terms of investment in economic development and tourism in the area, it's higher in Inverclyde than Scotland and the family group average. So again, it's a complex, it's a complex picture. But I don't know if the team want to talk a bit about City Deal projects and the work that they've been doing in that space. 

Michael Wilkie  1:40:33
Yeah, sure.
Just 2 observations. In our interactions with the council and through some of the best value thematic, we have commented quite a number of times about partnership working and I think the council has a number of examples of working well with community partners and organisations in order to deliver services locally and in
a focused way that perhaps addresses inequality otherwise. 
All I would say on City Deal projects is we had made an audit recommendation which continues to be followed up that the council needs to ensure that it delivers them in a timely way and monitors them on an ongoing basis.
And there has been some sort of issues.

Nichola Brown  1:41:19
Chair, if it’s possible to come in…

Jo Armstrong  1:41:20
Please, yes. Please do.

Nichola Brown  1:41:22
…with a supplementary question. 
I'm glad you mentioned the community engagement agenda there because for me that came through very strongly in this report, and I think potentially there are areas of really good practice that could be highlighted in respect of others. So I was particularly struck by Para’s 15 to 19 about the citizen and community engagement.
It seems that Inverclyde is very proactive in finding a range of mechanisms to involve communities and that's reflected in the high percentage of people in the area who were feeling a sense of belonging. So I picked that up in the CPP report. 
So Inverclyde Alliance seems to be doing something really quite proactive and innovative, I would suggest, and even looking at the transformation supplementary, the fact that the council consulted communities to inform its transformation plans,
that that wasn't just what we sometimes see as a consultation survey or a set of pre-formed projects. It actually indicates that it wasn't only about engaging communities, including vulnerable groups, but co-design. And I think co-design is something that's very easy to speak about, less easy to evidence. 
So I suppose my question would be, in a rambling fashion, is there anything particularly around the community planning partnership, the Inverclyde Alliance, that stood out for you in terms of how they are formulating the way they go about things, because it's really impressive actually what they are doing.

Helena Gray  1:43:20
Michael, I'll probably pass that one to you based on your observations.

Michael Wilkie  1:43:25
I don't think I could cite something in particular at the moment other than that reflection that across a number of our best value thematics and annual audit reports we have included some case studies of good practice. 

Nichola Brown  1:43:37
Yeah, and those are very good, stand-out. The child poverty example is particularly interesting, as that's a priority across the country, not just in Inverclyde.

Helena Gray  1:43:50
Yeah, and I think that the independent evaluation of that as well found that it had been very successful in addressing the fact it’s …

Jo Armstrong   1:44:04
That one of our case studies that we … yeah? 

Helena Gray  1:44:07
So I couldn’t for sure tell but I’m sure it will have been. We can check that within our overview.

Jo Armstrong  1:44:20
Are we done with performance, moving on to governance. Malcolm.

Malcolm Bell  1:44:26
OK. Yeah, thanks again, Chair, and thanks for the report, Controller. 
There’s mention in the report of a delay in updating the local development plan. I think there’s a target for getting that updated by March next year. So just how confident are you that that will be met and also linked to that, there's a number of … beyond their due date for review and update, and I think that … health and safety, and so on. 
Is your assessment that the council are giving that … prioritisation in terms of resolving it, linked to the risk that the delay is leading to.

Helena Gray  1:45:25
I'm not sure we have an update on the local development plan other than that it has slipped to March, but I’ll bring in the team in case they do. But I think on the policy reviews, just to highlight that there has been significant progress with those. 
I believe that more than 70 of those policies have now been updated and received committee approval. And that there are only a few that are outstanding for very specific reasons, and that there is now an approach to monitoring and embedding those updates on a cyclical, on a planned basis. So I think good progress in that regard, but on the local development plan…

Michael Wilkie  1:46:09
Yeah, I'm conscious that the council has reached the stage of publishing its evidence report and consulting on that … whether that enables it to meet the revised deadline or not…
And I would maybe just add on the policies and procedures, the council has taken that very seriously and definitely addressed all of the ones that we've highlighted in our, drawn out by exception in our initial report, along with some other, you know, other 70 odd project… policies, and now has them scheduled within its monitoring system for regular reviews. So it is taking appropriate action.

Malcolm Bell  1:46:44
I guess your answer to my second question helps give me assurance on the first question. So I mean, they've got a record of catching up and getting back on track, which would give us confidence that the March 27 target is, chance that’ll be met. That’s what I'm picking up, yeah.

Jo Armstrong  1:47:13
Ruth.

Ruth MacLeod  1:47:15
Thank you. I just wanted to ask a bit about the digital work that's happening.
Whether the digital maturity assessment work has now been completed and how that's feeding into the plan for the kind of digital customer services strategy if we know. And it looked like that there was not that much pace in some of that work potentially. And I just wondered what the thinking was around that and if the maturity assessment is one of the things that's going to help inform the wider digital strategy, if they can sort of identify where there are gaps in terms of technology and how it's being used.

Helena Gray  1:47:56
Michael, you might have an update and on that point, the pace, I suppose, but I think there was an update to the Policy and Resources Committee earlier this year and the digital maturity assessment I think has now been complete, but I don't know if you want to…

Michael Wilkie  1:48:09
Yeah, I think the council in setting its digital modernisation transformation plan, has the oversight through its board, as I said, chaired by the Chief Executive. It set out the process it was expecting to follow, starting with rejoining the Digital Office and approving the budget for that, and then conducting external maturity assessment and then external customer services assessment, and it set out the timetable and committees they expected to report to and so far I believe it has, we've not yet reviewed the output as part of this year's audit, but it has conducted the digital maturity assessment in line with the timetable it set. Whether that timetable is ambitious or not is subjective, but the council is following the process that it set out and the timeline to date.

Ruth MacLeod  1:48:58
That will come back in future audits, presumably, how that's then feeding into further digital strategy work.

Jo Armstrong   1:49:09
Can I ask, the changeover of the chief exec and the CFO within the year, in the last 12 months, has that had any impact on performance, delivery, ability to deliver the statutory duties? 

Michael Wilkie  1:49:25
I've got no known evidence of anything detrimental. I suppose we're just going into the year-end financial statement audit for the year in question, but we're progressing that as we would expect.

Jo Armstrong   1:49:37
Good, good. I assumed that was the case but I just thought I'd ask. OK, thank you. Christine. 

Christine Lester  1:49:40
Yeah, it's a question around flexible working, paragraph 35.
They said there was an assessment of the impact of hybrid working on service quality outcomes and then reported the results of the staff survey. I just wondered if there was any other measures looked at because I think staff are always going to report fairly positively on the availability of flexible working.

Helena Gray  1:50:12
So I think the staff assessment was in relation to hybrid working and it was a staff survey. 272 staff were invited to complete the survey. And I think as it highlights here that it was 40% felt that there was no impact on service delivery, but I think you're right, unless the team tell me otherwise, that it was it was an assessment based on staff. I suppose what you'd have to do in terms of looking at service performance and outcomes, I think if that's the point that you're making would then be to look at things like the LGBF as well… 

Christine Lester  1:50:52
Yeah, exactly. In the paragraph, it said the council worked with the Improvement Service to make the assessment of the impact on service quality and outcomes, but actually they didn't. They looked at the implications for staff working. Well, staff satisfaction with the way in which they were working. 

Helena Gray  1:51:09
No, so the survey asked staff the extent to which they thought hybrid working was impacting on service delivery and outcomes…

Christine Lester  1:51:18
Oh right, OK.

Helena Gray  1:51:19
So it's not just about satisfaction, but it's the extent to which…

Christine Lester  1:51:21
How would they know?

Helena Gray  1:51:23
Well, if, they’re the service providers, it was their, it's based on their assessment of whether as a result of hybrid working, it's affected the service that they're delivering.
So it's slightly different to a satisfaction… So I suppose I take the point that it's a staff survey, but it's not a survey about their satisfaction with hybrid working. It's about the staff's assessment of the impact on the service. 

Christine Lester  1:51:49
But there's no other measure?

Jo Armstrong  1:51:51
It will come through in the LGBF. 

Christine Lester  1:51:53
It will come through in the end?

Helena Gray  1:51:54
Well… and that would, I suppose, you'd end up looking at whether it was a correlation or a causation. But it's an, I suppose it’s an assessment…

Christine Lester  1:52:05
How useful is it on that basis then?

Helena Gray  1:52:09
It’s part of a picture that is used to build up a view on service delivery.

Jo Armstrong  1:52:15
It's not the whole picture, Christine, but it is an important one to understand how staff are thinking about the effect of it on them and their services, the extent to which that feeds through to service quality. You have to look to LGBF and council would then have to be asked, do you think it's important to ask the wider picture, but that's not part of this process, take the point.
Mike, did you want to ask anything under this topic or not?
Well that’s shocking!

Andrew Burns  1:52:47
Well done, Ruth! 
[Laughter]

Jo Armstrong  1:52:51
We've reached, we're reaching the end of our questioning that we've kind of got clarity around. Is there anything else subsequently you want to pick up on? 
I think what we're hearing is that this is a good, this is a good performance audit, a good best value, good insights into what the council's managing its services.
Thank you both for coming along. Thanks, Helena, for giving us this new, this additional report today and we will consider in private how we want to take this forward.
[Long pause]
OK, there is no other public business for discussion today, so we're now going to close the public session.