Agenda and draft minutes

The CJC CEO Eifion Evans welcomed everyone to the Mid Wales Corporate Joint Committee Government and Audit Sub-Committee Meeting and introduced everyone around the room.

To receive apologies of absence –

Lynne Hamilton, Independent Member

Apologies received –

Independent Member (Powys County Council)

Lynne Hamilton (LH)

Ceredigion County Council

Carwyn Jones-Evans (CJE) – Corporate Manager: Strategic Economy Investment / Strategic Lead – Growing Mid Wales

To receive any disclosures of personal interest relating to matters to be considered on the agenda

There were no disclosures of interests to declare relating to matters to be considered on the agenda.

To appoint a Chair and Vice Chair

As this is the first meeting the Committee members discussed who should be appointed as Chair and Vice Chair of this forum.

The legislation requires that an independent member should be appointed as the Chair and Vice Chair of this meeting. 

Appointed Chair – Alan Davies, this was proposed by Cllr. Gareth Lloyd and seconded by Cllr. Elizabeth Evans. 

Appointed Vice Chair – Lynne Hamilton, this was proposed by Clive Pinney and seconded by Craig Stephenson.

Alan Davies will now Chair the rest of this meeting.

To approve the Terms of Reference for the CJC Governance and Audit Sub Committee.

The CJC Governance and Audit Sub Committee Terms of Reference (pages 3 – 5) was brought before the Committee for approval.

The Terms of Reference (ToR) is an extract from Section 5 of the CJC’s Constitution. Membership of the governance of the Committee consist of one lay member from each of the Councils (Powys/Ceredigion CC) and two Councillors from each of the Councils. Also, when the Committee is considering the Strategic Development Plan (SDP) it will include a lay member from the National Parks.

Typically, at least one-third of the Governance and Audit Committee consist of independent members, which this Committee has. In accordance with Section 1.5 of the ToR this Committee appointed a Chair at its first meeting – Alan Davies.

The Governance Audit Committee scope is set out in Section 2 of the ToR, which DH provided a verbal overview on in the meeting. The work programme still needs to be determined, which will be discussed later in the agenda.

The Committee is required to meet at least once annually, but CP recommends that this Committee meets at least bi-annually.

Comments

AD stated that the scope within the ToR does not mention how risk is overseen. CP confirmed risk is managed by the Committee via a Risk Register – which still needs to be produced/developed – being it is early in the operational stage of the CJC.

AD queried how frequent the ‘Regularly’ monitored treasury management reports will be – 2.11 of the report. CP confirmed the reports will be monitored at each of the committee’s meetings – be this annually or biannually (twice a year).

AD mentioned that there has been comments from Auditor General on the progress of CJC’s across the county, but as this is the first meeting of the Mid Wales Governance and Audit Sub-Committee and the next one will not be until December – they need to show progress. EE stated that the pace for this group isn’t absolutely necessary, as the Local Government Elections Act 2021 recommended that a ‘vehicle’ was used to fast-track decision making processes and the CJC structure was suggested – Minister Julie James stated the CJC was ‘a tool that can be utilised to whatever benefit it can provide to any regional partnership’. The CJC structure is beneficial as it allows decisions to be fast tracked, so they do not have to go through the eleven individual scrutiny committee or LA cabinets to make decisions. However, Powys CC and Ceredigion CC legal partnership already provides an alternative delivery model, so they do not need to create a separate arm’s length entity which employs its own individual staff etc. Therefore, there is currently no benefit in utilising the CJC any further than they have done so already.

Thus, CJC’s budget is a nominal fee of just over £300,000 and the region does not have to employ people accountable to a separate Chief Executive, S.151 officer etc. Instead, they have a shared responsibility between Ceredigion and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

To receive Audit Wales reports:

·       CJC Board Report and 22/23 Annual Return

·       MWCJC 23-24 Audit Approach Letter

·       Letter regarding 23/24 Audit fees and CJC response

·       Letter with Commentary on MWCJC progress

·       Report on the progress of CJCs across Wales

DH provided a verbal overview of the following reports, which were provided to the members for their information. Note: going forward external auditors will come to these meeting and present the reports themselves.

·     CJC Board Report and 22/23 Annual Return

The 2022/23 Annual Return has already been presented and signed off.

Please note as the level of transactions is very low it is the annual return style of accounts, not a full statement of accounts - which are only prepared if they cross £2.5M in gross expenditure/income tax.

£160,000 of contributions and a total spend of £76,000 - £77,000. Powys and Ceredigion contribute to all aspects of the CJC, while Brecon Beacons only contributes to the Strategic Planning side.

The accounts have been audited by Audit Wales and fully signed off. With no matters being drawn to this committee’s attention by Audit Wales.

·     MWCJC 23-24 Audit Approach Letter (P15)

This letter outlines Audit Wales approach and their fees. There were two levels of fees – the Accounts Audit fee (under £2,000) and the Performance Audit fee (over £2,000), which combined to an overall fee of just over £4,000. As a CJC the performance work was not requested, but Audit Wales decided to carry it out. They produced a national summary report across Wales and an individual letter for each CJC. 

A Financial Audit Report is the statement of accounts – if they are above £2.5M it is full-blown statement of accounts, but if they are below this amount it is a simplistic annual return).

A Performance Audit Report is any other (non-financial) matter which the auditors choose to look at. For example, it could be general performance, general direction of travel of the CJC, national themes or particular issues they are focusing on (e.g., a piece of work on strategic planning, transport, economy, etc.). The theme they focused on last year was reviewing the general progress of delivery of CJCs from a wider perspective.

·     Letter regarding 23/24 Audit fees and CJC response.

DH is Ceredigion’s and the CJC’s chief financial officer and S.151 officer – he is wearing two hats. As the CJC is a separate legal entity with its own bank account/ledger he needs to look through a different lens for them. When he received a letter from Audit Wales referring to the performance audit report and its cost. He was disappointed to be notified late on that Audit Wales was doing this piece of work and the CJC was going to have to pay the privilege of it – his response to Audit Wales is outlined on page 25 of the pack.

·     Report on the progress of CJCs across Wales

This is Audit Wales National report on CJC’s progress. This report gave five recommendations, which are outlined fully on page 42 – 43 of the English pack. A number of these recommendations are in progress, which DH provided a verbal update on.

Recommendation 1: Due to technical reasons the first meeting of the Governance and audit  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

To receive a Report from the Chief Executive Officer –

To receive a progress update report on the establishment and operation of the Mid Wales Corporate Joint Committee and its Sub Committees.

Appendix 1 – Mid Wales CJC Corporate Plan

EE the Chief Executive Officer provided a verbal overview of the progress update report, which outlines the establishment and operation of the Mid Wales CJC and its Sub Committees.

There are three specific areas, which are incorporated into the Mid Wales CJC: -

1.  Strategic Development Planning (SDP)

2.  Regional Transport Planning (RTP)

3.  Economic Wellbeing (EW)

Membership

The Chair and CEO of the CJC changes annually between the two leaders. This year Cllr. James Gibson-Watts is the Chair, with EE taking on the role of the Chief Executive Officer to support James – so there is one person from each LA. At the next annual general meeting, the CJC Chair will swap to the leader of Ceredigion and Emma Palmer will take over the role of the Chief Executive Officer. This has been agreed in advance.

The pack mentions the jobs within the CJC and their roles, however it does not list the various commissioners funded across Wales. The language commissioners have requested that Powys and Ceredigion get to their level of standard. However, it is impossible to have standards which are relevant for both LAs – as the LAs standards are some of the largest in Wales, Welsh is a first language for many people and in Powys the standards might be lower as they are on the English border. If both LAs have the same sets of standards, it will cause a lot of financial issues for Powys to get to the same standard as Ceredigion. However, if they give the documents trans lingually, Welsh speakers can speak Welsh and they have translation, then this should satisfy the commissioners.

Sub Committees

There must be a democratic standard in the CJC subgroups, as it would not be fair if only the two leaders and one person from Bannau Brycheiniog had all the powers to decide on everything – without there being input from the democratic side in the subgroups. The subgroups were created so the recommendations can appraise what is discussed politically. EE compared Mid Wales CJC approach to Cardiff’s CJC – how the MWCJC jobs/roles are added to officers existing roles (e.g., as CEO EE does not get any extra remuneration for other jobs added to his role). If in the future they have to appoint/pay staff in the region, either Ceredigion or Powys would be responsible for this person – as the employee would work on behalf of the two LAs.

Delivery Progress

The funds for the Regional Transport Planning strategy have started to come in. They have challenged the Minister many times regarding the process that they are following currently for the strategy because if they need to create a strategy and planning strategy, then the main strategy across the region should be created first. Government have requested that the transport strategy needs to be developed before they create the SDP. However, this puts the cart before the horse – they should be concentrating on the SDP itself, before planning things under it. Powys in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

To consider a forward work programme.

This subcommittee does not currently have a forward work programme. However, as mentioned in the Terms of Reference it is up to this group to determine their work programme.

It was agreed that NW (as the programme lead for the joint committee) would draft the forward work programme. NW will also draft the template/model for the CJC’s Risk Register before the next meeting. It was suggested that the risk register is brought to every meeting, so the group can review latest risk status.

ACTION: NW will draft the forward work plan and risk register for the CJC, prior to the next meeting.

AD queried whether there any briefing or information sessions that this group need to have to take a wider context, rather than dealing with the agenda as presented. EE suggested that now they hold off on this, because the construction of the CJC is in its infancy. They are still grappling with the requirement according to legislation, compliance with various acts and different sets of legislations. Plus, they are getting communication from civil servants about certain service areas, and they are referring to the CJC when these service areas do not sit under the CJCs legislation. EE attends national meetings with senior civil servants from Cardiff to try and trash all of this detail out. The biggest complexities they have are associated with the Commissioners whose requirements are just growing. The Commissioners state that under their legislation they are responsible for holding legally constituted bodies to account for compliance, so unless WG tell them differently, that is what they intend to do. Therefore, they are trying to demonstrate to the Commissioners that they are holding them accountable for things, which are currently just superficial. They still have a lot of background work to do around the final principles of how the CJC is delivered, so until they have 100% sorted out of the governance for the MWCJC they should hold off on this. As soon as they have this clarity, then they will think of the additional requirement of the CJC.

CS queried whether there were any Audit Wales reports, which are critical for this group to progress – to avoid getting a negative report from Audit Wales.EE confirmed that they have had one on one meetings with Audit Wales, explaining the position of the MWCJC and where in the journey they are in the constitution, governance and delivery of service areas. They have subsequently revised down their fees quite dramatically from where they were initially. The CJC’s performance will be progressed by getting the governance in right, so they are now in the position Audit Wales expect the MWCJC to be.

EE* mentioned it would be useful if at the next meeting they could have a list of plans expected of the MWCJC (e.g., Corporate Plan, Powys LDP, SDP, Biodiversity Plan etc.), along with position of existing partnerships (e.g., TraCC, PSB) to see if there is going to be crossover/duplication etc.

EE stated that there are  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

None

Board agreed to hold the next meeting in September/October, being mindful of purdah.

ACTION: The Host Authority (Ceredigion) will set the date of this meeting.

1.    NW will draft the forward work plan and risk register for the CJC, prior to the next meeting.

2.    The Host Authority (Ceredigion) will set the date of this meeting.