Issue - meetings

At its 25^th March 2021 meeting, the Committee approved arrangements whereby Surrey County Council (SCC) would provide a comprehensive finance function to TDC comprising the Section 151 role; leadership and management of a full range of financial functions; and support through the Tandridge Finance Transformation (TFT) plan. Ricky Fuller (Surrey County Council’s TFT programme manager) presented a report which informed the Committee about the outcome of the initial due diligence phase, including an analysis of current weaknesses and suggested actions to address them as part of the TFT plan. This analysis had been shared with a ‘Member / Officer Reference Group’ on 17^th June. The coverage of the report included:

• guiding principles for the finance function and the role of finance within TDC;

• an ‘overall mission’ to:

Ø  blend the skills, experience and expertise of the Surrey and Tandridge teams into a high performing, resilient, finance function for the Council

Ø  build a trusted, proactive and insightful Finance Service which is at the heart of a strong culture of financial management, accountability and evidence-based decision making across the Council

Ø  improve processes and use systems more effectively to increase efficiency, free up capacity and strengthen controls

• five workstreams to transform the finance function and the role of finance within the Council, i.e.

Ø  a new finance model and staffing structure, with a blend of TDC directly employed staff and senior members of the SCC finance team

Ø  a transition of the SCC team to provide management oversight, best practice guidance and (in some cases) take on delivery of services to TDC

Ø  organisational development to strengthen financial management

Ø  measures to strengthen the exchequer function

Ø  effective delivery of the 2021/22 budget and the savings required while incorporating any key outcomes of the Grant Thornton forensic review.

• proposed ‘roadmaps’ of activities for the finance and exchequer functions until the first quarter of 2022

• a governance regime for the TFT plan.

The report explained the need to invest in strengthening the finance team to allow the shared SCC service to fulfil its objectives. The anticipated increased staffing costs were £27,000 in 2021/22 and up to £76,000 in 2022/23 and annually thereafter. Two additional one-off investments would also be required, namely:

·                  £30,000 associated with the role of a Finance Transformation Lead (0.5 FTE) which had been offered as a development opportunity to the TDC finance team – the cost would allow backfilling for the successful candidate

·                  £50,000 for a short-term exchequer services change team.

A risk analysis of the TFT plan was provided within the report, together with the outline terms of a proposed Joint Working Agreement (JWA) to act as the legal basis for the partnership. The Chief Finance Officer advised that, had the risks been ‘RAG’ rated, they would be classified as ‘amber’. It was agreed that the Vice-Chair of the Committee (in addition to the Chair and Group Leaders) should be consulted by the Chief Executive regarding the completion of the JWA (Resolution C below refers). 

During  ...  view the full minutes text for item 68