Potto: Bailliff Fodder?
- – an “In My View” article by NIGEL WARD, investigating a catalogue of deception and wittingly false information published by Cllr Andrew WILDE in Potto Parish Council’s meeting Minutes, in another failed and long-protracted attempt to deceive and mislead the Authorities into believing the Council’s increasingly desperate propaganda about how it (mis)handled the 2022 Public Interest Report.
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The Public Interest Report (PIR) issued to Potto Parish Council in July 2022 by its External Auditors (PKF LITTLEJOHN LLP) was probably the most significant document ever received by the Potto Parish Council (PPC). Amongst the circa 10,000 small Council’s in the UK, a grand total of only 4 PIRs in the last five years were issued following Audit Investigations – such is the extremity of the atrocious governance of those who do receive PIRs.
However, rather than acknowledge the 17 specific Recommendations in this PIR, then seeking expert advice from the YLCA or NALC, and then begin to address these desperate problems, Cllr Andrew WILDE (the unelected Chair) argued about every one of the 17 Recommendations and even tried to appeal the PIR.
I covered this debacle in an earlier article:
Potto Parish Council’s External Auditors issued a six-page Audit Report [link] on 30th May 2024, following a 10-month forensic investigation into the many and serious problems with the Council’s 2022-23 Annual Accounts. Qualification 9, which occupies pages 3, 4 and 5 of this Audit Report, describes in excruciating detail what remains to be addressed in the PIR; see excerpt below:
The Report’s Findings conclude with “Recommendation not implemented” or “not fully implemented” for 13 out of the 17 Recommendations. (I have personally investigated the other four Recommendations that are not included on this list, and are therefore presumed to be compliant).
Whilst R5 and R6 have (arguably) been addressed (Potto Parish Council has published a list of dates on which its Agendas and Minutes were published on its website), some of the dates on these lists have been falsified, so as to obscure the fact that some Agendas were published in breach of the LGA 1972.
For R13, whilst the Council has now published a ‘General Privacy Notice’, it is not acting in compliance with that Notice. The Council’s records include a plethora of data breaches which are not only a breach of the Data Protection Act, but breach the details in the freshly published ‘General Privacy Notice’.
What can one say about a Council which makes up its own rules – and then proceeds to break them?
In respect of R17, the Council has subsequently received some advice from the Yorkshire Local Councils’ Associations (YLCA) regarding Audit Investigation Fees, but not has secured any advice or support in regard to the proper means of addressing any of the PIR Recommendations (because it did not ask for any!).
I would confidently suggest that the expert and authoritative view of the External Auditor is quite clear – the 2022 PIR has been treated with complete disdain, outright derision and utter contempt. Normal service at Potto Parish Council.
Potto Parish Council’s view of this PIR is also quite clear. Immediately after the Auditor’s Investigation Fees were settled in February 2023, (and without seeking any advice about how to address the PIR or recording a single iota of work about how any of the PIR Recommendations had been – or were being – addressed), the minutes for the April, May, September, October, November and December meetings in 2023 state:
Readers may be perplexed as to why a Council would feel the need to repeat this arduous task of reviewing all 17 of the PIR actions at each meeting. If the review had been done professionally and the results recorded properly, once would, quite obviously, be enough.
But, shockingly, this fiasco continued. The January, February, (March cancelled), April, May, (June cancelled) and July minutes for 2024 each reiterate the same message – that the Council agrees the PIR Action Plan has been completed.
The Audit Report (recording that the PIR Recommendations have not been implemented) was issued on 30 May 2024, but the next scheduled meeting in June was cancelled, without any declared reason.
There was a meeting in July, but only two Potto Councillors had the courage to attend. This means the meeting was inquorate, as a minimum of three Councillors are needed to hold a meeting, and so no business could be transacted.
The minutes for the August and September 2024 meetings each record – shock horror – in naked defiance of the 30 May 2024 audit report, that:
Poppycock! Potto Parish Council is not only refusing to accept the factual evidence cited in the May 2024 Audit Report, it is evincing the rank effrontery to contest PKF’s Invoice for this Report. These Minutes state:
Because this AGAR Additional Work only became necessary in virtue of the Council having point-blank refused properly to address the previous PIR Audit Recommendations (July 2022), the Council has only itself to blame. In any case, this Invoice is dirt cheap considering the huge amount of work done by the diligent and very patient External Auditor.
Oh, and I nearly neglected to mention . . . the Investigation Fee for this Audit Report was just over 150% of the Council’s entire Annual Budget, so the Council is financially BUST.
The October meeting will be most interesting – if the bailiffs don’t arrive first! Watch this space . . .
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