Further to my previous post, the Auditor’s report on the Statement of Accounts has now appeared on the agenda for Wednesday’s Audit Committee.
The report states that the council has overrated some of it’s assets to the tune of 38.5m. This includes an overvaluation of three sports pitches by whopping 19m. The Auditor has identified ‘significant weaknesses’ in the council’s approach to asset valuation and has indicated that in future, the Wales Audit Office may bring in external valuers rather than rely on the council’s own.
Of greater significance is the fact that there are currently several plans, or ‘Asset Transfers’, going through for town or community councils to take over local parks, sports pitches etc from the county council. Given the auditors remarks, that valuations need to be ‘documented and correct‘, I would suggest that before they sign on the dotted line, these smaller councils get a second opinion… they wouldn’t want to fall victim to creative accounting…
On a separate issue, during a sample test of asset ownership, the council could not supply any evidence that it was the owner of the Carmarthen Community Education Centre worth over half a million quid. They’re currently hunting for the paperwork… In another sample test the auditor recommended urgent action after finding that the council had been breaching it’s own Contract Rules by paying for external IT support contracts in advance, two were worth around 70,000.
If faults such as these are coming up in ‘sample tests’, I dread to think what the full picture might be.
The Auditor also recommended that the council should take a closer look at using some of it’s reserves ( 122m) to ease the cuts to public services.
As I said2 the other day, this was exactly what Plaid had proposed when in opposition in Feburary. It was a bit disappointing to watch the Executive Board webcast today and see the very same Cllr Jenkins make no reference to his words from February, even including a specific warning about using reserves. Quite a u-turn, again.
Whilst I’m on the subject of the webcast, (all very cosy, even Meals on Wheels were scrapped without a murmur) the executive board also approved the decision to offload the leisure services to an external trust. I use the word ‘decision’ loosely, as it was actually decided months ago. This was clearly illustrated by Meryl’s introduction of the plan as a gift from heaven rather than as an objective appraisal.
The chief executive then joined in to crush potential future dissent by waxing lyrical over the inclusion of possible new Leisure centre for Llanelli in the tender. He informed the Board that this might not be just any old Leisure Centre though, this could possibly be a ‘Wellness Centre’. The difference in cost was 16m ( 9m from the council) for the former, and 60m (amount from the council not divulged) for the latter.
Mr James mentioned various vague EU grant pots, cash from the Health Board (which has so much to spare dosh of course..) and even the involvement (not defined) of the Swansea Bay City Region Board. All in all the chief executive though it was “incredibly exciting”… Hard pressed Carmarthenshire taxpayers be warned; the Parc Y Scarlets Stadium, and before that, the Boston Sports Arena were similarly described as ‘incredibly exciting’ by Mr James…turned out they were just incredibly expensive.
I’d keep him well away… Cllr Derek Cundy (Lab) almost spoiled the cosy and agreeable atmosphere by exercising his newly given right for backbench councillors to ask questions at Executive Board meetings. He wondered, with all the excitement, what was to become of the less commercially viable parts of the Leisure department which were not included in this ‘trust’; the museums, libraries, archives etc?
That was an ‘entirely different thing’ said Meryl, who clearly had no idea.
Back again to the Audit report and for the fourth year running, the auditor is highly critical of the council’s ability to properly manage grants, including those EU schemes (see previous post ‘Absent report3‘) with which they’ve had such, er, trouble. Significantly, but not surprisingly, the auditor’s warning is not aimed at a particular department but to ‘Those charged with Governance‘, which goes back to the dismal way this council is run; “…For a number of years we have reported weaknesses within the Council s grants management processes.
Internal Audit has already issued a critical report on the Council s management of the Welsh Government s Supporting People grant to the July 2015 Audit Committee.
Our 2014-15 grants work is in its early stages but we have again identified concerns regarding some of the WEFO European grant schemes…”
References
- ^ Auditor’s report (democracy.carmarthenshire.gov.wales)
- ^ said (carmarthenplanning.blogspot.co.uk)
- ^ Absent report (carmarthenplanning.blogspot.co.uk)
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