Issue - meetings

The Interim Section 151 Officer presented the quarterly risk update for the Executive Committee’s consideration.

Members were informed that there had been an audit of the Council’s risk management arrangements in 2018/19 which had resulted in some recommendations being made.  Some action had been taken in response to the audit findings but, when the Internal Audit team completed a follow up audit, it had been concluded that some actions had not yet been fully completed.  In March 2022, the Corporate Management Team (CMT) had reviewed risk management arrangements further and, whilst some examples of good practice had been identified, it was felt that effective risk management needed to be led by senior officers and embedded in the authority.  Officers had been appointed on behalf of each department as risk champions to help with this process moving forward.

Risk monitoring reports were due to be presented for the consideration of the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee during the year.  Due to the time that had elapsed since the previous update to Members concerning risks, Officers had concluded it would be appropriate to present a report on this subject to the Executive Committee prior to the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee on this occasion.  In future, updates to the Executive Committee would follow after the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee had had a chance to consider the subject.

The Executive Committee was advised that, in order for a risk to be classified as a corporate risk rather than a departmental risk, it needed to have the potential to result in significant damage.  When the report had originally been drafted there had been 119 departmental risks identified for the authority.  By the date of the meeting, this had reduced to 96 departmental risks.

Following the presentation of the report, the Executive Committee discussed the need for elected Members to be kept informed of the Council’s risk management arrangements on an ongoing basis.  The role of the Risk Champion on the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee would also help to ensure that Members remained appraised of risk management arrangements moving forward.

RESOLVED that

1)          the definition of a Corporate Risk be approved;

2)          the present list of Corporate Risks be approved;

3)          the use of the Risk Management Framework devised by Zurich be approved; and

4)          the progress made on the Action Plan approved by CMT on the 16^th March 2022 be noted.