Apologies received from Cllr Williscroft with Cllr Wilson attending as substitute. Clive Douglas (Independent Person) also sent apologies.

There were no declarations of interest.

RESOLVED: That the minutes were agreed with the following update:

-       Page 2, ‘beyond reasonable probability’ to be amended to ‘balance of probability’.

The Executive Director of Finance and Digital introduced the report.

Legislative changes to procurement were highlighted which created an opportunity to review minutes and authorisation to make things more meaningful, members would have the opportunity to be involved in this early on.

Some of the proposed changes included were administrative such as changes to departmental names and roles of titles through the recent restructures, amending reference to the public contract regulation 2015 to relevant procurement law, update to procurement requirements due to the numerous procurement regulations and procurement transparency regulations that were due to come in February.

A summary of the recommendations in Appendix 1 of the report was provided.

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• For the proposal related to local SME and providers, they would work with the internal comms team and also have a section on the Merton webpage where this would be highlighted. When going to out tender, they would ensure that relevant SMEs were invited to participate. 
• The living wage requirements would not change.
• Call-in rights would not be impacted.
• Officers worked on the strategy, which was approved at officer level. The award would then go to Cabinet and so Cabinet and lead members that would still feed into the strategy.
• The strategy required approval before proceeding to an award. The decision of who the contract was awarded to would be taken away from Cabinet but the lead member would be consulted in the decision making process and had discretion to push to Cabinet. A member of Cabinet would be part of the decision making body.
• Scrutiny would have involvement in terms of the framework.

It was RESOLVED that the committee agreed the recommendations.

Report to follow,

The Head of Internal Audit introduced the report.

Page 5 of the report provided an update on the current outstanding Priority 1 actions, 9 of which were carried over from previous years.

Two new audits were added, Control and Monitoring of Agency and Interim Staff which picked up some of the issues around off contract staff in relation to evidence of DBS checks, mandatory training and leavers forms not completed. The other audit added was in relation to Procurement Cards which was also highlighted within the report.

The Director of Public Realm also provided an update and informed members that they could make transitions to meet the zero emissions vehicle target by 2030. Key factors to consider included charging infrastructure at the Civic Centre and Garth Road Depot as well as how to downsize the larger vehicles. Two key steps to be taken in the short to medium term were to provide charge points at the Civic Centre car park and at the Depot. Next year they will develop the long term strategy based on recommendations 

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• They don’t have number of Merton vehicles and home parked vehicles to hand but can provide these. It was not possible to provide a charge point for every owned vehicle, but they could provide high capacity charging provisions on sites such as the Depot and Civic Centre.
• School budgets was an area of concern and would be revisited as part of the audit plan.
• A transport management strategy plan had not previously been done. The Director of Public Realm had only been in his post for 3 months and agreed that this had taken too long. They aimed to take the report to Cabinet in Q1 of 2025.
• Part of The Global Internal Audit Standards needed to be interpreted for the public sector. This covered all businesses, and they were awaiting further guidance. Further clarity could be found on page 9 of the report. Not many changes were made but further clarity on the Audit Committees role was provided. This would come into place in April, they were happy to share more information with members once available and highlight the changes at the next committee meeting, although these would not be significant.
• The Audit Plan was put in place for the year ahead and they expected to be on target. There were 18 programmes at present, they could discuss with the Director if there was capacity to add the financial management and governance of the proposed large developments planned by the Council.
• In relation to 4.15 of the report relating to DBS checks, details were not provided on the specific areas within the organisations that the checks related to. Further checks could not be done on 5 out of the 8 DBS checks. The reason to go off contract, as they understood it, was to gain more specialist agency use but they were unsure on associated costs.
• DBS checks were a requirement that helped staff who  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

Report to follow.

The Assistant Director for Fraud (SWLFP) introduced the report.

Working alongside colleagues, the team continued to look at temporary accommodation to review what could be done in terms of contributions.

At present, Merton Council were running above where it should be but there was a large case at present that impacted resource.

As part of the partnership with four other boroughs, Merton’s governance was found to be robust.

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• Right to Buy was 0, the alignment within the report was wrong.
• Tenancy fraud provided by housing providers included Clarion as well as others. There was now an officer who went out and worked with providers directly and more frequently. They hosted a partnership for housing associations which received good take up.
• In relation to page 19 of the report, the target was 9 but they currently had 5, with 3 going through the legal process. The legal process at present was approximately 14months as Merton had to go through the Croydon Court. The cases were not all Clarion and included other housing providers.
• Table 2 gave information of the volumes of referrals received that went through triage. Table 3 detailed the sanctioned outcomes achieved, some of the data went to directors and not to members.
• In 2023/24 there were 8 cases, 4 of which ended with sanctions.
• Table 3 figures showed what was due to be recovered which may be impacted if they were successful, for example, via court order.
• From the 2023/24 figures, 31 of the cases included some that carried over.
• For the table on page 24, ‘other’ included internal figures, for example.
• Going forward tables 2 and 3 could be mapped in a clearer way as well as others within the report.
• Table 3 was driven by fraud and will be updated.

It was RESOLVED that the committee noted the report.

The Head of Financial Strategy and Capital introduced the report.

The contracts of existing risks were coming to an end, and they were looking for new contractors for the risk system. Unfortunately, Q2 information could not yet be shared as it had only just been signed off by CMT. Q1 information had already been presented to the board.

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• A session covering cyber-attacks was scheduled for March and would include a presentation from the Head of IT. The training will be open to Councillors.
• In relation to substantive risks, there was a lot of collaboration with other Councils across London and nationally to understand the issues and mitigations. Some of this work could be seen in the Risk Report. Beyond the benchmarking risks, material issues were looked at collaboratively within the industry.
• The report included some information on risks around budget, some of the planned spend mentioned were all encompassing risks which were accounted for where there was significance or deviation from the budget. There wouldn’t be a specific line for each expenditure, but it was captured overall.
• Within the report, key areas of risks were mentioned on page 5. Risks were reviewed and an update would be provided.
• The Housing Delivery Report reported on potential indicators which were fed into this report.
• The relevant person could feed back on the risk description, but the consequences essentially spelled out the risks. There was a lot of narrative within the report which could be more succinct but what could happen was laid out in the consequences column.
• There was information on the points raised in July regarding the Pandemic, but they were not included within this report, it would be at the discretion of CMT to include this.
• They could review the consequences and wording again, but they would have to negotiate this with the risk owner. There was a review based on the committee’s feedback in regard to the narrative being clearer and were happy to continue to work on this.
• A legally balanced budget had to be put forward.

It was RESOLVED that the committee noted the report.

The Assistant Director of Customers, Policy and Improvement introduced the report.

The requirement to publish the Corporate Complaints Report was not statutory but recommended.

The cases escalated to the ombudsman continued to be relatively small. Rates of escalation per 100,000 population was lower than average for local authorities which suggested services were delivered in a way that didn’t require complaints but when complaints were raised, they were dealt with in a satisfactory manner.

A key issue was the timeliness of responses which was partly due to process related issues. A new complaints solution was introduced, and they continue to work on improvements. If complaints were not responded to within statutory timescales, residents were kept updated and responses were provided within a timescale that was agreed with individuals.

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• In regard to the timeliness of responses to requests for information, they continued to work closely with the relevant services where ombudsman cases were ongoing. There were causes of delays for example, if a social worker was on leave and the information could not be accessed. There was a small number of cases that went to the ombudsman with 13 cases in 2023/24 that were accepted as valid cases. For the 2 cases where the outcomes weren’t responded to on time, the required outcomes related to areas such as changes to policy and training, which were difficult to evidence. To address this, a new template was introduced to allow services to easily set out what they had done which could then be provided to the ombudsman. 
• Tables 1 and 2 on page 122 were different ways of presenting the same information. Table 2 included a full range of cases; Table 1 did not have the same level of information. They were happy to look at combining the two tables as part of improving the reporting that came from the system.
• To prevent reoccurring complaints, as part of the complaint outcome there was a section in the system to input what could be done differently next time. This was fed back into the service and the complainant was informed on what would be done differently. There was then follow up to check that the suggested changes were implemented.
• Three reports were produced. The Children Social Care and Adults Social Care were statutorily required to be published but it was not a statutory requirement to publish the Complaints report.
• Agreed to provide an update from the Youth Council at the next committee meeting.

It was RESOLVED that the committee agreed the recommendations.

The Executive Director of Innovation and Change introduced the report.

A continued reduction in agency spend was achieved. Between January-October 2024, £2.7m less was spent on agency staff compared to a similar time period last year. By the end of the calendar year, they forecast to have spent £3.5 - 3.7m less which was encouraging.

A huge amount of work was done for senior recruitment and they had now filled the second tier.

Section 4.18 of the report which detailed 62 members of staff on high dates was from June and the figure was now 30. Great progress was made in relation to the apprenticeship levy spend, between January and September 2023 it was £345,000 and was now £200,000. Sharing the apprenticeship levy with businesses helped, with 3 local businesses currently supporting with apprentices which equated to approximately £3,500 per month. 

A Business Engagement Manager, who came as an apprentice, was appointed to the Council.

For clarity, the sickness and absence chart figures represented days per whole time equivalent.

In response to questions, it was confirmed that:

• Senior recruitment was focussed on improving diversity at the top of the organisation which was the area most impacted. A more open minded brief was given to recruiters, and they were open to look at candidates who were stepping up. Gender representation was not an issue at the top of the organisation and appointments were made to candidates from diverse ethnic backgrounds. Job applications increased by 37% and there was a 75% increase of visits to the recruitment page. There was a 93% increase from temp to perm conversions which was positive.
• Agency workers were covered by the living wage.
• There were no interns.
• The apprenticeship levy could only be spent on the training part of the apprenticeship and not on salary. If they did not have the funds to employ the apprenticeship, they could not access the levy. This was partly why they used part of the levy to train Merton staff and work alongside businesses, otherwise a large part of the levy would have to be sent back to the Treasury.
• Unsure of 0 hour contracts but they would usually be used in relation to sessionals. The Executive Director of Innovation and change would find out and let members know.
• It was agreed at Cabinet that from April, cleaners will be on the London Living Wage.
• The demographic could be broken down to include length of service. Merton had an older workforce demographic with a high proportion of staff over 55. Whilst the experience was wonderful, many would retire within the next 10years.
• High retention was good but could also make it hard for people to progress which often resulted in junior staff leaving, so it was important to be creative when looking at progression routes.
• School contract runs on a different timescale and not up for another 2yrs.
• If charities were in a position to employ apprentices, then discussions could be had in regard to the apprenticeship levy. Merton  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9.

Report to follow.

The Chair confirmed that this was moved to the next meeting due to a delay in receiving the report.

An additional meeting was scheduled for December. This was regrettable but despite guarantees made at the previous meeting, external auditors were not ready for this meeting. It was unsatisfactory and of concern that they failed to undertake their task.

The Executive Director of Finance and Digital informed members that he was meeting with the Senior Lead tomorrow morning and would pass on the feedback.

It was RESOLVED that the committee noted the report.