Report attached.

The Chair took this item next (Minute 14 refers).

The Committee considered the report from the Council’s internal auditors, BDO, detailing the findings and recommendations of the audit review of Business Improvement and Technology – Systems Interfaces.

Gurpreet Dulay, Internal Auditor BDO, presented the report.

The Head of Business Improvement, tabled a briefing paper (attached to this minute) detailing the background to the ICT service migration; the scale and range of the issues that arose from 1 April 2016; the current situation; and proposals for the future.  She assured the Committee that the ICT service was now moving beyond the problems of the implementation phase; that call levels had returned to normal levels; and that the team was focused on embedding new processes and improvements in the service.  The Chief Technology and Information Manager, assured the Committee that all 57 business systems used by the Council had performed satisfactorily during the migration and that the problems had been with the associated file locations and permissions.

The Executive Director, Organisational Development and Corporate Services informed the Committee that no further major changes were planned; that the new contract arrangements offered the Council greater resilience; and that a councillor working group was being established to monitor on-going developments for members’ ICT needs.

The Committee asked that an officer report be presented to the September meeting detailing the lessons learnt from the ICT transition and indicating how the problems experienced this time would be avoided in the future.  They requested that the report address the following points:

·         procedural arrangements

·         realistic deadlines and timescales

·         the impact on reputational risk from the loss of public facing services

·         details of the monetary / non-monetary costs of the transition of the ICT services against the anticipated savings form the new contract

·         how the relationship with the County Council and new service provider worked in practice

·         consequences of service failure impacting on councillors performance

The Committee noted the report.