Agenda item

The Committee considered an update report on corporate and departmental risks.

The Section 151 Officer reported that a corporate risk had been added relating to General and local elections, which had anticipated that the General election would be held later in the year and might impact on the Local Government Settlement. Given that the election had been announced for July, this risk would probably be reviewed at the next meeting. Two risks had moved from amber to green (COR 17 and COR 21) due to mitigating actions. There were four new departmental risks.

At the last meeting of the Committee, Members had asked for details about the Amber rated Housing risks relating to gas safety inspections, asbestos and mould and where the responsibilities lay for such services between the Council and the relevant housing associations.  The Section 151 Officer reported that the landlord was responsible for maintaining properties to the relevant legal requirements and in Bromsgrove for social housing this was BDHT. The Council’s liability would apply to buildings it owned.

During consideration of the report issues discussed included:

·       Members welcomed the improvement in the performance of planning in terms of quality and speed of decision making.

·       It was queried whether the risk to procurement should be upgraded to ‘red’ given the magnitude of the function. The Section 151 Officer responded that there would be more detail in the quarterly monitoring reports, but officers were taking steps to manage procurement risk.

·       How cyber security was being addressed – The Section 151 Officer gave broad details of actions being taken. He undertook to raise with the ICT Transformation Manager a query raised by about being able to use the Council’s phishing report system when logged on via a non-council device.

·       Whether consultants were being used to address the non-adherence with statutory inspections – It was confirmed that specialists were used due to the nature of the work.

·       Delivery of levelling up funding and how this was being managed to reduce the risk of non-delivery.  The Section 151 Officer responded that an update report would be presented to Overview and Scrutiny. Risks were managed dynamically with the contractors at Windsor Street and Market Hall projects. Members suggested that the detail in the report relating to the Levelling Up and UKSPF projects risk could be made clearer.

·       In response to a question the Section 151 Officer reported that currently the projects funded by Levelling Up funds were due to meet the relevant targets for using Government money.

·       Whether the Council ‘stress tested’ health and safety compliance – The Section 151 Officer would report back on an external review of the Council’s compliance.

·       In response to questions the Section 151 Officer gave details of how the Council was preparing for the requirements of the Environment Bill.  However, clarity on the preferred fuel for vehicles in the future was needed before firm plans could be made. Arising from this it was suggested that potential service failure should be included as a risk.

RESOLVED that the present list of Corporate and Departmental risks be noted.