The Committee is asked to note any apologies for absence and substitutions received from Members.

There were no apologies for absence submitted nor substitutions on this occasion.

To confirm and sign as a correct record, the minutes of the last meeting of the Committee, held on 26 September 2024.

It was moved by Councillor Sudra, seconded by Councillor Morrison and:-

RESOLVED that the Minutes of the meeting of the Committee, held on 26 September 2024, be approved as a correct record and be signed by the Chairman.

Councillors are invited to declare any Disclosable Pecuniary Interests, Other Registerable Interests or Non-Registerable Interests, and the nature of it, in relation to any item on the agenda.

There were no declarations of interest by Councillors in relation to any item on the agenda for this meeting.

Subject to providing two working days’ notice, a Member of the Committee may ask the Chairman of the Committee a question on any matter in relation to which the Council has powers or duties which affect the Tendring District and which falls within the terms of reference of the Committee.

On this occasion no Councillor had submitted notice of a question pursuant to Council Procedure Rule 38.

To present for consideration and approval the following, to enable final opinions on the accounts and value for money arrangements to be formally issued by the External Auditor:

·      The External Auditor’s Updated Audit Completion Report relating to 2020/21.

·      The External Auditor’s Combined Audit Planning and Audit Completion Reports relating to 2021/22 and 2022/23.

·      The External Auditor’s Combined Annual Report for the years ended 31 March 2021, 31 March 2022 and 31 March 2023.

·      The Council’s Statement of Accounts (including the Annual Governance Statements) for 2020/21, 2021/22 and 2022/23 for consideration and approval for publication by the backstop date of 13 December 2024.

The Committee considered a report of the Director (Finance & IT) (A.1) which presented for consideration and approval the following, in order to enable final opinions on the accounts and value for money arrangements to be formally issued by the External Auditor:-

·      the External Auditor’s Updated Audit Completion Report relating to 2020/21;

·      the External Auditor’s Combined Audit Planning and Audit Completion Reports relating to 2021/22 and 2022/23;

·      the External Auditor’s Combined Annual Report for the years ended 31 March 2021, 31 March 2022 and 31 March 2023; and

·      the Council’s Statement of Accounts (including the Annual Governance Statements) for 2020/21, 2021/22 and 2022/23 for consideration and approval for publication by the backstop date of 13 December 2024.

Members were reminded that, on 30 July 2024, the Government had set out proposals to tackle the backlog, which included setting a backstop date of December 2024 to clear the backlog of unaudited accounts up to and including the financial year 2022/23. This aimed to enable the system to refocus on recent accounts where assurance was most valuable. There were also five further backstop dates up to, and including, the financial year 2027/28 to allow assurance to be rebuilt over several audit cycles.

The Government had laid before Parliament two pieces of legislation that would give effect to those proposals: the Accounts and Audit (Amendment) Regulations 2024 and, on behalf of the Comptroller & Auditor General of the National Audit Office (NAO), a Code of Audit Practice 2024.

The Committee was made aware that the Accounts and Audit (Amendment) Regulations 2024 had come into force on 30 September 2024, which had removed the current requirement to publish audited accounts for financial year 2023/24 on that date. The deadline for the publication of audited accounts for 2023/24 would, instead, be 28 February 2025 in order to coincide with the second backstop date. The Regulations also amended the date by which bodies should publish draft (unaudited) accounts to 30 June 2025 for financial years 2024/25 – 2027/28. Auditors were now required to produce timely audit opinions (which might result in the issue of a disclaimed or modified opinion).

It had been acknowledged that issuing modified or disclaimed audit opinions where audits could not be completed by a backstop date could be uncomfortable for stakeholders, including Local Authorities themselves. However given the scale of the backlog and the absence of viable alternatives, the Government had taken the difficult decision to proceed with the backstop date approach highlighted above.

It was felt important to highlight that the Government recognised these measures as exceptional in nature and that local bodies should not be unfairly judged based on disclaimed or modified opinions, caused by the introduction of backstop dates that were largely beyond their control.

Auditors were therefore expected to provide clear reasons for the issuing of such opinions in order to mitigate the potential reputational risk that local bodies might face.

It was reported that in-line with the backstop dates previously discussed, the Council’s External Auditor had substantially completed the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 52.