UKHSA Advisory Board: Audit and Risk Committee minutes
Updated 2 February 2023
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Date: Tuesday 24 January 2023
Sponsor: Ian Peters
Purpose of the paper
The purpose of the paper is to provide the Advisory Board with minutes of the 11 October 2022 meeting of the Audit and Risk Committee. The minutes were agreed on 24 November 2022.
Recommendation
The Advisory Board is asked to note the minutes of 11 October 2022 meeting of the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) Audit and Risk Committee (ARC).
Minutes (confirmed)
Present at the meeting were:
- Ian Peters – Chair of UKHSA Advisory Board (Chair)
- Simon Blagden – Non-Executive Member of UKHSA Advisory Board
In attendance were:
- Deputy Director Finance, Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC)
- Senior Governance and Business Officer
- Director General for Finance, DHSC
- Governance and Business Manager
- Deputy Director UKHSA Commercial
- Jenny Harries – Chief Executive
- Philippa Harvey – Director of the Covid Vaccine Unit (CVU)
- National Audit Office
- Lead Assurance Advisor
- Scott McPherson – Director General, Strategy, Policy and Programmes
- Gerry Murphy – Non-Executive Member, DHSC
- Deputy Director, Accounts and Finance Operations Branch
- Government Internal Audit Agency
- Director, Emergency Response and Health Protection
- Government Internal Audit Agency
- Andrew Sanderson – Director General, Finance, Commercial and Corporate Services
- Chief of Staff, Commercial
- Alex Sienkiewicz – Director of Corporate Services
- National Audit Office
- Lead Risk Advisor
- Head of Counter Fraud
- Deputy Director of Financial Operations and Control
Apologies from:
- Government Internal Audit Agency
- Sir Gordon Messenger – Non-Executive Member of UKHSA Advisory Board
- Donald Shepherd – Director of Finance, UKHSA
Introductions and apologies
22/056 The Chair welcomed all attendees. Apologies had been received from Sir Gordon Messenger.
22/057 Gerry Murphy was warmly welcomed to the meeting, where he was attending in an observer capacity as Chair of the DHSC Audit and Risk Committee. As set out in the Terms of Reference for the Audit and Risk Committee, the UKSHA ARC provides assurances with escalation if necessary to the DHSC ARC.
Minutes of the previous meeting
22/058 The minutes from the last meeting on 11 July (enclosure ARC/22/015) were agreed.
Matters arising
22/059 The action list (enclosure ARC/22/016) was noted.
22/060 The Chair reported that interviews for the substantive Chair of the ARC would take place at the end of October.
22/061 The Chair confirmed that he had been in discussions with the Chief Executive and the Director General, Finance, Commercial and Corporate Services to ensure that as many overdue audit actions as possible were closed ahead of the November ARC.
UKHSA governance, risk and assurance
Strategic Risk Register
22/062 The Chair noted the good progress in respect to the Strategic Risk Register (Enclosure ARC/22/17). The risk register, as presented, was the outcome of the fundamental review of the Strategic Risk Register (SRR) carried out through a top-down exercise by the ExCo and the new strategic risk profile.
22/063 The Strategic Risk Register had also been discussed at the Senior Accountability Meeting (SAM) with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and as an example, deep dive conversations on cyber security had followed and focused on areas including working collaboratively with UKHSA and DHSC, and recognising potential threats.
22/064 In respect to the risks on Emergency Preparedness and Pandemic, further work would also be taking place with Director General, Health Protection Operations and Chief Operating Officer, Testing on the future arrangements and organisation of these within UKHSA.
22/065 While it was recognised that the number of risks currently identified at 18 was high, this was accepted as appropriate for the organisation at this stage of its development, and it was expected this would be reviewed as the SRR matured.
22/066 The Strategic Risk Register and risk profile matrix were noted by the Committee.
22/067 It was agreed that an updated Strategic Risk Register would return to the ARC in November and would be presented to the UKHSA Advisory Board in January.
Alex Sienkiewicz
Internal audit actions update
22/068 The Director General, Finance, Commercial and Corporate Services introduced this item (Enclosure ARC/22/018). It was recognised that further work was needed to ensure a proactive approach to closing audit actions and that there had been progress made since the previous meeting.
22/069 The Lead Assurance Advisor had been working with teams on the overdue actions to be closed. Some actions related to Public Health England, and it was recommended that these be reviewed to ensure they remained relevant for UKHSA.
22/070 As part of the closure of internal audit reports, it was suggested that realistic target dates for actions needed to be set. In the coming weeks, a number of internal audits were expected to be completed and will create a rise in the number of internal audit actions. The Chief Executive reported that the internal audit actions are reviewed by the Executive Committee on a weekly basis to review appropriate dates for completion and ownership of correct personnel. This focus would be maintained at future Executive Committee meetings.
22/071 The Director of Corporate Services provided a brief update for Governance, Risk and Assurance internal audit actions and confirmed that the new Chief Risk Assurance Officer would be joining at the end of December.
22/072 The UKHSA ARC noted the report.
Commercial re-set
22/073 The Director General, Finance, Commercial and Corporate Services introduced the paper (Enclosure ARC/22/0190) which set out how the commercial function was key for UKHSA.
22/074 The Deputy Director, UKHSA Commercial set out the progress to date and that a re-set of commercial was agreed as a wider programme with tighter controls, increased delivery while also addressing the findings from recent National Audit Office (NAO) and Government Internal Audit Agency (GIAA) reports. This programme of work included a potential internal commercial campaign, such as holding roadshows and developing commercial champions. The team was also introducing contract amnesty across UKHSA to ensure that all contracts were collated centrally. The programme also including training, with commercial colleagues offered trained at foundation level to improve capability in contract management.
22/075 A risk to the programme included the recruitment and retention for Senior Executive Officer (SEO) and Higher Executive Officer (HEO) level due to the differing pay scales of other government bodies. This could be mitigated by offering supplements to staff and fund professional change. The Chair asked that a future agenda item on recruitment and retention be discussed at a future ARC.
22/076 The Director, Emergency Response and Health Protection (DHSC) congratulated the Commercial team on their work to date and raised the important of ensuring commercial expertise was integrated into incident responses.
22/077 The Deputy Director, Commercial UKHSA confirmed the importance of good industry engagement and to have a productive relationship with suppliers, particularly to support UKHSA responses to incidents.
22/078 The chair was supportive of a centralised contract management team ensuring that their valuable expertise was fully realised while working with business areas across the organisation.
22/079 The Government Internal Agency explained that it would be good for both the ARC and the Executive Committee to have assurance for planned milestones for the programme of work. It was agreed that the Deputy Director, Commercial UKHSA would produce a paper on recommendations on how to manage contracts on business and resourcing to be discussed at a future Executive Committee.
Jac Gardner
Sarah Collins
Vaccine taskforce transition
22/080 Director General, Strategy, Policy and Programmes reported that the Vaccine Taskforce had successfully joined UKHSA on 1 October, with progress made across a series of milestones.
22/081 The elements of the Vaccine Taskforce joining UKHSA were the commercial and scientific processes and vaccine R&D, COVID-19 vaccine selection, supply and deployment policy. Following the transfer, the CVU was established in UKHSA from 1 October 2022. The paper (enclosure ARC/22/020) set out those risks that had been inherited by UKHSA.
22/082 One area of concern related to the transfer was staffing and ensuring that the team had a suitably qualified, engaged and effective staff base. The Chief Executive noted that tight time frame to successfully transfer the functions and her priority had been to ensure that those colleagues joining UKHSA felt supported and welcomed by the organisation.
22/083 The paper also set out the portfolio risks that concerned the delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine programme.
22/084 The Chair welcomed and thanks the Director of the CVU to UKHSA and noted the updated.
22/085 ARC members agreed that a further updated on the Vaccine Taskforce transition would be needed at an appropriate time.
Philippa Harvey
Annual accounts 2021 to 2022 and standing financial instructions
22/086 The Director General, Finance, Commercial and Corporate Services introduced the annual report and accounts (Enclosure ARC/22/021) were the first set of accounts and initial draft of the Annual Report and Accounts.
22/087 This was a significant piece of work, that had to be completed within strict timescales. Progress was being made on audit, and teams were working to respond to queries quickly, with the expectation that the accounts would be certified before the end of November, the dependency with the DHSC accounts was also recognised and was expected to be completed within the same timescales before any qualifications were accepted.
22/088 A concern was raised regarding the number of accruals, which were a result of the scale of the operations facing the team during the pandemic. The Finance Operations team was making progress in addressing these. An update would be provided at the next meeting on the current status.
22/089 The ARC recognised the scale of the task and noted that teams were working to complete the audit work as a priority.
22/090 The Standing Financial Instructions were also presented, and these were endorsed by the ARC.
Counter Fraud
22/091 The Head of Counter Fraud introduced the paper (Enclosure ARC/22/022) which set out UKHSA’s approach and strategy for investigating fraud and also the renewed efforts to support UKHSA in identifying and finding fraud and increased reporting.
22/092 The ARC welcomed the strategy, and it was agreed that an action plan to set out how it would be implemented with the associated timescales would be produced for Executive Committee agreement and shared at a future ARC meeting for additional assurance
[name redacted]
Internal audit
22/093 The Head of Internal Audit provided an update on the 2022 to 2023 plan covering 6 months from October to March (enclosure ARC/22/023). It was reported that eight audits had taken place, five being complete and three in draft. The work had been expected to conclude in June and it had been taking longer than anticipated to complete audits. It was noted that 3 audits will come back to the ARC in November.
22/094 The Chair thanked [name redacted] and the team for their ongoing work and support to UKHSA.
External audit
22/095 The Engagement Director, NAO provided an update on progress on the samples listed in the audit progress paper (enclosure ARC/22/028) since this was issued. There remains significant work to be completed. The ARC noted the report.
22/096 It was agreed the Chair would receive weekly updated on the progress of the audit and this would be facilitated by the finance operations team and colleagues from NAO.
22/097 The Chief Executive agreed to sign the Letter of Understanding with the NAO, which would be signed and returned.
Jenny Harries
ARC forward look
22/098 The following items were agreed for the forward look:
- cyber risk (November)
- deep dive on skills recruitment and retention
- strategic risks – emergency response incidents for high level risk issues
Any other business
22/099 The Chair informed the Committee members that once the new Audit and ARC Chair was appointed, as part of their induction, they would have 1:1 meeting with the other Non-Executive Members of UKHSA.
22/100 The Chair thanked all attendees and there being no further business the meeting closed at 11:50am
[Name redacted]
October 2022