Agenda item

The Committee had before it a report by the Chief Internal Auditor which  presented the planned Internal Audit report on Corporate Landlord Responsibilities.

The report recommended:-

that the Committee review, discuss and comment on the issues raised within the report and the attached appendix.

In response to a question as to whether officers were in agreement with the findings of the audit, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord noted that management had accepted the recommendations made. 

In response to a question relating to the budget for Corporate Landlord, and the fact that the spend on the budget for 2024/25 had been more than 50% over budget, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord advised that the audit related to statutory compliance work, but that the budget also covered essential repair and maintenance work, as well as capital work and replacement work.  He explained that historically the spend had been approximately 50% on planned maintenance and 50% on reactive maintenance, however due to the construction cost inflation over the last few years, the statutory responsibility work had been undertaken first with less work on planned maintenance, which he acknowledged carried its own risk.  This resulted in a portfolio which generally needed more work, and the current target given to the Corporate Landlord was to maintain buildings at a condition C rating until the size of the portfolio could be reduced.  He explained that the service had ongoing discussions with Finance colleagues about essential spend outwith statutory responsibility work, and the budget provision was being reviewed at present. 

In response to safety issues raised and whether there was an acceptable level of risk, and if not, how much budget was required to address the issues, the Chief Officer – Finance noted that although the budget for the last year had been £3.3m, the spend had been £5m, which highlighted that extra spend had been allocated to address certain issues.  The Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord added for the assurance of Members that the statutory compliance work instructed had been undertaken, but the report highlighted that there were some areas where there were higher costs.  He gave an example of a contractor who has been instructed to undertake work, but when statutory checks had been undertaken, further work was found to be required which then needed to be organised and undertaken.  As certification was not done until the end of that process, this could sometimes take 6 to 8 weeks, therefore in the case of a June 2024 certificate, the June 2025 certificate might not be available until August or September due to the additional work required.  The Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord further explained that much of the issue stemmed from contract management, and work was underway to look at consolidating external contracts which would mean that more officers could manage fewer contracts, allowing better use of resources. 

In response to a question about the level of staffing within the service, the Executive Director Corporate Services advised that the organisation would always carry a level of vacancy but much effort went into trying to fill those vacancies.  He noted that there was a lack of availability within the market for some of the vacancies within Corporate Landlord.

In response to a question about the transformation programme to redesign the service, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord advised that there were around 18 different workstreams looking at repairs and maintenance across the property estate and therefore officers were looking at how these were prioritised and delivered.  One priority was the consolidation of the housing asset management database work, and immediate resource being directed to manage contracts and encourage contractors to upload documentation to Council portals which would free up staff resource.  While there were some short term actions being worked on, a number of actions would be taken forward over a longer period of time and officers would look to consolidate these.  Following a question relating to whether a new system could assist with addressing some of the issues, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord advised of a new module to the Confirm system which had been released which should assist with the process and give more assurance to officers and Members.

In relation to a question as to whether a new specialist contractor for emergency lighting was in place, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord advised that this was now the case.

In relation to a question as to whether the Council was at risk of setting standards and budgets where there was a strong likelihood of officers not achieving targets or actions, the Chief Officer – Finance noted that some of the questions asked on this report and the Housing Allocations and Choice Based Lettings audit were very relevant in terms of how the Council could manage and balance growth with savings within the budgets available to Chief Officers, and that he and colleagues would consider these points as part of the budget packs and reporting for 2026/27.

In relation to a question as to whether there were any issues not highlighted in the audit that officers wished to raise with Committee, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord reiterated that he wished to provide assurance to the Committee that there was a regime in place for statutory maintenance, as well as a robust process as to how work orders were raised and instructed.  He noted that the audit had highlighted a risk around how that information was recorded and actions followed up.  He advised that he and the Chief Internal Auditor had discussed where an audit might be helpful, and this report was the result of that discussion, therefore he was comfortable with where the service was at present.  He noted the particular lack of skills available to the Council around asbestos and the risks this could raise, as well as having external contractors who could decide when they did and did not do work for the Council, however added that such risks were captured within the audit report.

In response to a follow up question about the difficulties with recruitment in specialist areas, the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord highlighted that he should have nine chartered surveyors but the service currently only had three.  This meant that resource had to be bought in, which was expensive and could mean that it was difficult to have a proper handover with permanent staff. 

In response to a question as to how it could be evidenced that contracts, procurement and capital work represented best value, the Strategic Commercial Manager advised that a review group had been established at the end of 2024 has there had been a wide range of different framework agreements in place across various capital and building works.  Officers had already identified a need to review these, prior to the audit report, to ensure that future iterations of those agreements delivered best value.  She advised that an initial report had been produced considering options around future development and, there was ongoing review of framework agreements currently in place within building services which would be going through a procurement process.

The Executive Director Corporate Services proposed that the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord provide an update back to Committee on the progress of the recommendations, including which actions were budget-related and which were process-related.

The Committee resolved:-

(i)       to note that the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord would provide information to Members outwith the meeting on the number of staff in the Corporate Landlord cluster and the current level of vacancies in each area;

(ii)       to note that the Chief Officer – Corporate Landlord would provide a report to Committee in two cycles detailing the progress on the audit recommendations, including detail on which matters were related to available budget and which were in relation to the updating and reviewing of procedures; and

(iii)      to otherwise note the report.