Agenda item

1.    The Head of Internal Audit introduced the report which was the outcome of the recent SEND Home to School Transport (HTST) Lessons Learned Follow Up review. The importance of undertaking a Follow Up to such a major Review was emphasised by the Head of Internal Audit, who commented that it had not lost its importance because it was undertaken over a year ago. Members were reminded that the original review was commissioned by the Corporate Statutory Officers. General progress was referred to and it was highlighted that while progress had been made towards the drafting of a Memorandum of Understanding or Service Level Agreement in relation to delivery of the SEND HTST service, this had still not been finalised or put into effect. Completing this  was considered to be an important area to improve governance and have clarity of responsibilities.

2.    The Head of Internal Audit said that his team had received criticism for how the Review had been conducted in 2022 insofar that Management had not been provided with the opportunity to respond to the findings, this being the approach set out with the Corporate Statutory Officers. The Follow Up Review report had had been sent to 7 senior managers within the two relevant Directorates with a request for one consolidated response. There was further work required from the Directorates to provide this response.

3.    In response to questions and comments from Members it was said that:

a)    The Head of Internal Audit confirmed that the Follow Up of the review was not actively encouraged by all senior officers within the Council. It was decided by the Head of Internal Audit that a “halfway house” approach would be taken for the Follow Up. Therefore, the follow up review focused on 3 of the 11 areas from the original Review.

b)    The Corporate Director Growth, Environment and Transport assured Members that the responses to the Follow Up Review report had been sent to Internal Audit by 17 November 2023. It was said that the delayed response was due to staffing issues and the scale of activity taking place in the operational service. The Director of Education and SEN said that the allocated timeframe for response fell in the school holidays when many CYPE staff were on leave. The team were required to report to the Department for Education every month and this additional work had put further strain on forward planning in CYPE. 

c)    The Director of Education and SEN said that there were concerns raised by officers about the original report which had not yet been addressed. It was also highlighted that there were 19 actions from the management action table contained in the ‘SEND Transport Review Report - Management Response Update’ that had not been reported to the Committee.

d)    The Director of Education and SEN assured Members that the objections and concerns raised by herself and the Corporate Director Children, Young People and Education did not undermine the commitment to transparency and accountability or the teams’ work to address the issues identified in the Review. The Director of Education and SEN could circulate the objections to the Governance and Audit Committee for assurance purposes. The Director of Education and SEN requested that Members consider receiving an update on all 44 actions.

e)    It was agreed that an updated report including the management response would be shared with the Committee. The Committee would then consider whether there should be subsequent Follow Up reviews to the SEND Transport lessons Learnt Review of September 2022 and, if so, the timescales for review. It was suggested that the Committee could also receive the reporting information that is already being provided to the Department for Education for assurance purposes.

4.    RESOLVED to note the outcomes from the SEND Home to School Transport Lessons Learned Follow Up review, subject to management responses being brought back for consideration to the January Governance and Audit Committee meeting.