Visitors and members of the public who are unfamiliar with the building and procedures are advised that:

(a)      The fire alarm is a continuous loud ringing. In the event that a fire drill is planned during the meeting, the Chair will advise of this.

(b)      Exit routes from the chamber are located on each side of the room, one directly to a fire escape, the other to the stairs opposite the lifts.

(c)      In the event of the alarm sounding, leave the building via the nearest safe exit and gather at the assembly point on the far side of the car park. Do not leave the assembly point or re-enter the building until advised to do so. Do not use the lifts.

(d)      Anyone unable to use the stairs should make themselves known during this agenda item.

The Chair outlined the emergency evacuation procedure.

Councillors should not act or take decisions in order to gain financial or other material benefits for themselves, their families or friends.

The Chair will ask Members if they have any disclosable pecuniary interests (DPIs) or disclosable non-pecuniary interests (DNPIs) to declare in respect of items on the agenda. Members with a DPI in an item must leave the room for that item and may not participate in the debate or vote. 

Aside from disclosable interests, where a fair-minded and informed observer would think there was a real possibility that a Member might be biased or predetermined on an item, the Member should declare this and leave the room while that item is considered.

Members who are in any doubt about interests, bias or predetermination should contact the monitoring officer for advice prior to the meeting.

No interests were declared.

The Director of Regeneration and Neighbourhoods introduced the report by apologising to the committee for the outstanding action but reassured them that officers did take Audit actions seriously. She referred to the timeline of events shown at paragraph 2.10 of the report, which highlighted the number of changes that the planning team had gone through during the audit process. Going forward she was confident that the new planning team restructure, due to commence on the 1 April 2024, would address the outstanding audit action and more focus would be put on the business support element of the planning process.

The Chair invited Members to make comments, which included:

·           It was key that officers knew audit recommendations were serious and if they did not follow through the recommendations then they would have to appear before the Audit Committee to explain why the recommendation had not been followed through;

·           lots of negotiations had taken place with developers about Section 106 money, so it was upsetting to see that the non-financial contributions had not been monitored properly;

·           thanked the officers for the report;

·           member training was getting better which meant members were able to get more involved which was good to see;

·           could see the officers had good strategies and processes in place;

·           felt that the new management within the service had a positive impact;

·           was there a date for when the outstanding audit action would be reviewed?;

·           the reasons as to why the recommendation had not been completed could have been included in the auditors original report; and

·           in the past developers had not followed through on Section 106 promises so it was important that they were correctly monitored.

The Director of Resources responded to the way the auditor’s report was presented to the Audit Committee and said that her team were reviewing the layout of the reports to ensure that in future they were clear on any outstanding recommendations. She added that a review of the recommendations from Audit to officers was currently underway and a report on that work would be reflected in future internal audit update reports.

The Director of Regeneration and Neighbourhoods reminded members that the new planning restructure was due to be in place by the 1 April 2024 and the outstanding action would be completed before the next audit review date, which was end of April 2024.

Resolved:

(1)   That the explanation for the delayed completion of the Planning Services audit action, as detailed in the report be noted.