Agenda item - Public Involvement

To consider the following matters raised by members of the public:

(a)      Petitions: to receive any petitions presented to the full council or at the meeting itself;

(b)      Written Questions: to receive any questions submitted by the due date of 12 noon on the 3 January 2017;

(c)     Deputations: to receive any deputations submitted by the due date of 12 noon on the 3 January 2017.

(b)      Written Questions

(i)            Contract overpayments

58.1      David Croydon asked the following question:

“In the documents relating to Item 59 “Internal audit and corporate fraud progress report” for this meeting it says, “The corporate fraud and audit teams have together worked on a range of cases that have resulted in referrals to relevant authorities, recovery of funds and disciplinary action against Brighton & Hove staff.”

           Is this the last we are going to hear of the £513,000 overcharge?”

58.2      The Chair provided the following reply:

“Thank you for your question Mr Croydon that I understand relates to the sub-contractor overcharge on the Housing Repairs contract with Mears Ltd.

That issue was considered in detail at Audit & Standards committee on 12 January 2016 with further updates discussed at this Committee on 21 June 2016 and 15 November 2016.

It was also considered at Housing & New Homes Committee in January 2016 and the committee received a further update in September 2016. Housing & New Homes Committee have requested regular updates on this matter to review progress and a further report will be presented to the committee in Spring 2017.

In addition to the specific actions identified and disclosed at those meetings, the council is continuing to work with Mears to strengthen processes and procedures and is commissioning an independent review to identify further improvements that would benefit the partnership, residents and stakeholders.

Furthermore, as agreed as part of the Internal Audit plan for 2016/17, Internal Audit is currently carrying out a follow up review of housing repairs to assess the progress being made in addressing the issues and actions identified and the results of this work will be reported to this committee at a future meeting”.