Issue - meetings

25.1     The Audit Manager, Counter Fraud introduced the report. He outlined the formation of the Counter Fraud Team and summarised their current work. This includes a number of investigations for the Orbis partners and the submission of the data sets for the National Fraud Initiative. The latest submission on behalf of the partners was submitted in October with results from the matching exercise expected in January 2019. The Team will also be looking at all the partners’ counter fraud policies to update them, which is why the Anti-Money Laundering Policy has been refreshed and is being brought to Committee prior to approval by the Governance Committee.

25.2     The Committee asked for clarification of the organisations the Audit Manager Counter Fraud works for, and how many staff there are in the Counter Fraud Team. In addition to the Audit Manager, Counter Fraud there is a Principal Auditor, a Senior Auditor and two investigators based at Brighton to deliver Housing fraud work to Brighton and Hove City Council.  The Audit Manager, Counter Fraud manages the Orbis partnership team and also provides audit services to two other councils.

25.3     The Committee asked whether the customer identification system in anti-fraud work conflicts with the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).  The Audit Manager, Counter Fraud responded that as most of the Councils’ customers are fairly well known to the Councils and there has been little impact. The main risk areas are around property transactions and the Legal Teams carry out identity checks as part of undertaking the property transaction work.

25.4     The Committee RESOLVED to:

1) note the report and priorities raised; and

2) note the updated Anti-Money Laundering policy (contained in Appendix A) prior to submission to the Governance Committee for approval.