Brighton & Hove City Council
Audit, Standards & General Purposes Committee
4.00pm21 April 2026
Council Chamber, Hove Town Hall
MINUTES
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Present: Councillor West (Chair) Loughran (Deputy Chair), Baghoth, Guilmant, Helliwell, Hewitt and Meadows |
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PART ONE
55 Procedural Business
55a Declarations of substitutes
55.1 There were none.
55b Declarations of interests
55.2 There were none
55c Exclusion of the press and public
55.3 In accordance with Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972 (“the Act”), the Committee considered whether the public should be excluded from the meeting during consideration of any item of business on the grounds that it is likely in view of the business to be transacted or the nature of the proceedings, that if members of the public were present during it, there would be disclosure to them of confidential information as defined in Section 100A (3) of the Act.
55.4 RESOLVED - That the press and public are excluded from the meeting from items listed on Part 2 of the agenda.
56 Minutes
56.1 RESOLVED – That the minutes of the previous meeting held on 27 January 2026 be approved and signed as the correct record.
57 Chair's Communications
57.1 The Chair provided the following communications:
I have received apologies from Councillor Atkinson, who is unwell I understand. I’ve wished him a speedy recovery and of course we’ll miss his questions today. Since the last committee, members were invited to a training and engagement session organised by Internal Audit, which included discussing the draft Internal Audit Plan we have with us today. I was unfortunately unable to attend, but hopefully other members did and found that useful to informing the discussions today.
I’m pleased to say that since our last meeting in January, I have received my cochlear implant. I’m now getting used to my new hearing system. It’s a long period of personal adjustment and tuning by the audiologist. While I’m feeling confident that I’ll be able to hear you today, well I’ll find out in a minute, won’t I? And I’m beginning to be able to hear better than I was so I’m personally very pleased about that. When I was here last week I was having a bit of a struggle with the level of the induction loop. So I will try not to use that and I will see whether I can hear you through the sound system. So hopefully all will be well, but I know that you’re all very understanding of the challenges I face with my disability so just bear with me and we’ll see where we are thank you.
It’s a relatively short agenda today. We were hoping to take a couple of reports from the external auditor, but I understand these are now expected to go to our meeting in June. So that’s only another two months away, so we’ve got that to look forward to.
58 CALL OVER
58.1 The Democratic Services Officer called the agenda items to the committee. All items were reserved for discussion.
59 Public Involvement
59.1 No public representations were received.
60 Member Involvement
60.1 No member representations were received.
61 Internal Audit Strategy and Annual Audit Plan 2026-27
61.1 The Committee considered the Internal Audit Strategy and Annual Internal Audit Plan for 2026/27, underpinning the work of the Internal Audit Service in delivering the Annual Internal Audit Plan are the key principles and objectives as set out in the Internal Audit Strategy and Charter. These were presented alongside the Annual Internal Audit Plan for 2026/27 as good practice dictates that these should be updated and reviewed on an annual basis.
61.2 Councillors Baghoth, Guilmant, Hewitt, Loughran, Meadows, and West asked questions and contributed to the debate of the report.
61.3 RESOLVED –
That the Audit, Standards, and General Purposes Committee approves the Internal Audit Strategy and Internal Audit Plan and notes the Internal Audit Charter.
62 Internal Audit and Counter Fraud Quarter 3 Progress Report 2025/26
62.1 The Committee considered the Internal Audit and Counter Fraud Quarter 3 Progress Report. The report provided Members with an update on all internal audit and counter fraud activity completed during quarter 3 (2025/26), including a summary of all key audit findings. The report also included an update on the performance of the Internal Audit Service during the period.
62.2 Councillors Guilmant, Helliwell, Hewitt, Loughran, Meadows, and West asked questions and contributed to the debate of the report.
62.3 RESOLVED –
That the Audit, Standards, and General Purposes Committee note the report and consider the findings from Internal Audit activities in accordance with the Committee’s terms of reference.
63 Update on referrals under the Council's Whistleblowing Policy
63.1 The Committee considered the update on referrals under the Council’s Whistleblowing report. The purpose of the report was to note the Whistleblowing referrals and outcomes since the last update to Committee in September 2025.
63.2 Councillors Guilmant, Loughran, Meadows, and West asked questions and contributed to the debate of the report.
63.3 RESOLVED –
That the Audit, Standards, and General Purposes Committee note the report, including the whistleblowing referrals and outcomes.
64 Standards Update
64.1 The Committee considered an update on Standards-related matters.
64.2 Councillors Guilmant, Loughran, Meadows, and West asked questions and contributed to the debate of the report.
64.3 RESOLVED –
That the Audit, Standards, and General Purposes Committee note this report.
65 Items Referred For Council
65.1 No items were referred to Full Council for information.
66 Items for the next meeting
66.1 Councillor Loughran requested that the CIPFA report on the i360 be brought to a future meeting of the Audit, Standards, and General Purposes committee.
66.2 RESOLVED – Chair advised that the request will be considered. There were no reports agreed to be brought to the next meeting.
The meeting concluded at 5.50pm
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Signed
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Chair |
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