WEST THORNTON PRIMARY ACADEMY

BUILDING FUTURES

MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF

THE OPERATIONS COMMITTEE MEETING

ON

Thursday, 10th November 2016

Name / Governor Type / Present / Apologies / Absent
Sarah Rowe (SR) / Parent – CHAIR / X
Michael George (MG) / Appointed – VICE CHAIR / X
Georgina Harvey (GH) / Parent / X
Al-Rasheed Amzart (RA) / Appointed / X
Femi Yusoof (FY) / Parent / X
Di Pumphrey (DP) / HofS / X
Karen Dugan (KD) / Staff / X
Sherelle Lauder (SL) / Appointed / X
Annabel Thomas (AT) / Appointed / X
Astrid Soiza (AS) / Appointed / X
In attendance: Vanessa Walker – Assistant Business Manager, Julie Newman – Clerk to Governing Body
1 / WELCOME
  • Welcome
    To all governors and Vanessa Walker who will be the Assistant Business Manager until March when the Assistant Business Manger returns from maternity leave.

2 / APOLOGIES AND DECLARATION ON INTEREST
.
  • Apologies
    Governors received apologise of absence from Al-Rasheed Amzart, Femi Yusoof. Gina Harvey arrived at 7.20pm.
  • Declaration of interest
    The HofS confirmed that all senior staff with budget responsibilities have completed and signed a declaration of pecuniary interests.
  • Declaration of Interest – All Governors confirmed they did not have any business interests in any of the agenda items for this meeting.
.
3 / AGREE MINUTES OF THE 9TH JUNE MEETING
Minutes of the last meeting
The minutes of the meeting held on 9th June 2016 were agreed as a true and accurate record and signed by the Chair.
4 / AGREE CHAIR AND VICE CHAIR
Astrid Soiza nominated Sarah Rowe as Chair. Mike George seconded the nomination. Sarah Rowe was elected Chair.
Sarah Rowe nominated Mike George as Vice Chair. Di Pumphrey seconded the nomination. Mike George was elected Vice Chair.
FINANCE
5. / AUDIT LETTER
The CEO had instructed the Auditor to carry out an extra day’s audit of the WTA audit systems as poor practice had been highlighted. Governors noted this poor practice was not due to the performance of VW the current Assistant Business Manager. SR, GH and the HofS had produced an action plan in response to Laundau Baker recommendations following the report of 11th October from a one day audit check of the WTA audit systems. SR said she did not feel there was any major issue and thought the findings were attributed to housekeeping rather than mismanagement. Governors reviewed the audit response plan and agreed the actions and asked the VW and the HofS to report back at the Spring Operations meeting on the progress with the action plan.
ACTION 1: VW and the HofS to report back,on the progress with actions to the Audit Letter, at the Spring Operations meeting.
Operation Minutes Audit
Governors agreed to discuss the Operations minutes Audit from Item 19.
The HofS discussed with governors the Internal Audit Report of Governors’ Minutes for the Operations Committee meeting. This had been conducted by the CEO to monitor financial controls, systems and risks at WTA for the academic year 2015 to 16.
SR said governorspresent at these meeting thought outcomes and recommendations from the Audit were essentially factual procedures. She said governors and the clerk are fully aware of the financial elements that need to be discussed and reviewed at Operation Committee meetings. Governors present at these meetings also wanted to state for the record, that a number of items outlined as ‘not being reviewed during the meeting’had been reviewed. They did acknowledge that a number of the areas highlighted had lapsed, one being the Tender process for large projects. On this matter theHofS said she had a lot of experience with project managing school building projects and would not want to pay a project manager and suggested that she and members of the Operations Committee could perform the role of project manager. Governors thought this was an excellent suggestion and agreed they would not wish to spend money on a project manager and they would be happy to support the HofS with the project management. HofS said she would draft a tender procedure document and email to governors and when there was a project she would seek volunteers for the project management role.
ACTION 2: HofS to draft a tender procedure document to include project management role.
SR said in response to No 13 ‘governors should develop a timetable for the FGB and the Operations Committee including documents to be reviewed and approved at relevant dates, especially any future projects/building works’ she would do an initial draft and GH and FY volunteered to review the document. They would have this ready to issue to governors by the end of the month ready to send to the CEO.
ACTION 3: SR supported by GH and FY to produce a timetable of procedures in response to No 13 by the end of December 2016.
AT asked if they should have received monthly report. VW said yes they should receive monthly reports but unfortunately there have been a number of procedural and management reasons for not producing the reports.
Governors stated that they needed to receive the financial reports for discussion three days before the meeting. In future it would not be acceptable for governors not to receive the financial documents before the meeting.
ACTION 4: VW to ensure that governors receive all financial information monthly and three days before the meeting.
SR asked at what date governors should expect to receive the information via email. VW said Governors would receive the data by the 10th of the month. Therefore November reports would be ready by 10th December.
6 / AUDIT UPDATE FOR YEAR END 31ST AUGUST
The auditors have written an Interim Management Letter.
SR said it outlines WTA’s practices the auditor’s recommendations for improvements to our procedures. Governors can decide to act on the outlined improvements or we can respond to the management letter stating why we may not feel the need to change a procedure. SR said the auditor visits all the academies in the Trust and the overall process takes about three weeks. Governors discussed the auditor’s recommendations and the management responses.
- Number 2- VAT 126 Claim Form. Governors noted that this had now been dealt with by the Business Manager and agreed that they were satisfied this was now complete.
-Number 3 - Invoices from the Contact Caterer. The recommended checks were to be carried out by the Assistant Business Manager. SR asked how frequently this will be done. VW said monthly.
- Number 4 Personnel Files (this was a high priority recommendation). The management response was VW will ensure all the outlined documents are included on personnel files. This should be checked by governors. Governors agreed SR should look at four personnel files. On the 5th December SR will carry out a spot the check on personnel files to check all necessary documents are included in the file.
- Number 5 Purchases orders are raised,authorised and submitted to suppliers before goods and services and invoices are received. The management response was for VW to return any orders that do not have a purchase order. SR and governors agreed that there should be exception to this as there may be a requirement to make a purchase and retrospectively produce a purchase order. SR would like the Finance Manual to be amended to allow exceptions. Governors agreed this would be a good way forward as they would not wish for an emergency not being dealt with immediately because a purchase order needed to be raised. HofS explained the situation that had occurred this week when the power had been cut off in the street by accident and emergency engineers needed to come immediately she said in this incident there was no time to raise a purchase order. Governors agreed the HofS acted in a proper manner and that there would be other incidents in the future where there would be no time to raise a purchase order before instructing someone to fix the issue.
ACTION 5: SR to write to the Business Manager on this matter and to request that the wording in the Finance Manual is changed to allow for exceptional circumstance.
7 / BUDGET 2016/17
This budget had been approved at the Summer Operations Meeting and was to be noted at this meeting.
8 / MONTHLY MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTS
Governors had not be sent the Monthly Management accounts before the meeting. SR said it was important to receive the management accounts before the meeting to give governors enough time to review the management data.
VW said she was unable to give an accurate total breakdown as some income had not being posted. VW is working on the budget and an up to date budget will be provide as at end November by 10th December. SR said the governors would accept this lateness this time but in future the management accounts should be complete.
SR asked about the budget figure of 620% spend allocated to maintenance of premises. VW said this would be an accounting error and she would review the accounts and send an email to governors with an explanation.
ACTION 6: VW to email an explanation for the error associated to Maintenance of premises.
SR queried the difference between the budget and the forecast.
VW and Hof S said the school had receivedextra funding due to the split site funding and this will continue for the next five years when the school is full. The budget is £4,022,000 compared to the forecast figure of £3,961,000 is due to a lot of movement with pupils
SR queried the staff expenditure total with variance £228,941 against an actual of £245,212 and asked VW to look into the reason for this. VW said she would provide new Management Accounts for the month end November which would be ready in December. SR asked VW to provide a commentary explaining the budget against the variance.
ACTION 7: VW to provide governors with correct management accounts dated end November by the 10th December.
Budget holders report
Condition improvement fund / new boiler
HofS said £212,000 was the bid funding. We were still waiting for a final breakdown of costs from the company who carried out the work. The bulk of funding has been spent in the financial year 2016 to we are predictingan overspend. Governors asked for a report to be produced on the overspend and why this project exceeded budget giving the worst and best case scenario.
ACTION 8: Governors asked for a report with commentary on any overspend. VW and HofS to produce for 10th December.
Dining hall/gym extension
This has been completed but is over budget. This is due to the extra work to the extension which has enabled this area to be more useful for the pupils. The £55k was approved the extra is £12k to £15k for the kitchen, windows and security cameras.This extra budget has been taken from the 2015 /16 and £3k has been set aside from the 2016/17 budget. Governors had agreed to the extra work at previous operation meetings. Governors said they were satisfied that the extra money had been spend on a worthwhile improvement.
Staff room refurb
GH asked if this was completed in budget. HofS said yes this was within budget.
Year 3 Building Project
HofS said this went over budget and an email explaining to governors the reason for theoverspend had been sent to all governors for their approval,Governors approved the overspend by email. VW has copies of the approval emails.
ACTION 9: Governors asked for a report with commentary on any budget overspend on building works. VW and HofS to produce for the next Operations meeting.
Management accounts for teaching school and after school/breakfast club
VW said there were no management accounts to date as there were not the resources to post income. Governors asked for these accounts to be sent to them by email on a monthly basis. VW said in future they would be automatically generated and be issued with other management accounts.
ACTION 10: Management accounts for the teaching school and after school and breakfast club to be emailed to governors when the accounting process has been completed for Spring operations meeting.
9 / COST CENTRE REPORT
SR said it was difficult for governors to comment on the Cost Centre report as they had not been emailed a copy prior to the meeting.
The HofS said at this point in the academic year the expected expenditure should be around 17%. The spent % column shows the percentage spend to date which include actual spend plus committed spend.
The following costs centres were questioned by governors:
All year group spends which were over the expected spend. VW said had an over spend from the previous financial year and this has been posted this year which is an error. She said the year groups would stay in budget. GH said she was concerned of the over spend of Year 6 and this is the reason why it is important for governors to see the monthly cost centre reports so they can question over spends earlier.
STCOSTS - indirect staff costs was very high at 82%. SR asked why this was such a high overspend. This was costs for DBS checks which were essential. They will now only need renewing and this cost centre will end the year on budget.
AT queried the Teaching School cost centre which was at 43%. VW said there has been outlay on courses but as yet the income has not been received or posted. This will balance out over the next few months.
GH asked about the CSEN overspend of 86%. VW said this was the same reason as the Year group overspends.
AT asked why there were brackets around some of the figures. VW said this indicates an ‘income’.
10 / RENEWING OF SERVICE LEVEL AGREEMENTS
VW said there were no large contracts up for renewal. Governors were given a current contracts list to review and were invited to ask question on any of the current contracts and contract up for renewal.
HofS said the ‘mini bus’ 5-year lease was up for renewal in February 2017. We have a choice of purchasing the current bus and then being responsible for the up keep of the bus or starting a new lease. The HofS said she would like to upgrade to a new lease. The cost will be similar around £5,000 a year. SB asked who the lease was with. HofS said Castle Garage who also provide lease agreements to other Trust academies. MG asked if this included insurance and if not how much this would be. The HofS said the insurance was separate and was £667 a year. SL asked what the bus was used for. HofS said it is used every day. It takes children to sports events and other outside events. The explore zone use it for trips. She said it was currently being used to bring the children from the Hub to and from breakfast and afterschool club. SL asked if this limits the number of children who can use the clubs. HofS said yes potentially but we would be prepared to and have already walked children to and from the clubs. HofS said eventually we will be looking for the Hub to have its own breakfast and afters school club.
MG asked if they would consider getting a bigger mini bus. The HofS said yes they would consider getting two mini buses but there was an issue around parking and so at the moment this was not on the agenda. HofS asked if governors were happy to give approval of the lease of a new mini bus.
Governors agreed in principal to the lease of a new mini bus but this was subject to agreeing to the actual cost of the lease.
SR asked if any of the contracts were benefiting from us being part of a Trust. VW said yes we were benefiting from some contracts and Harrison Catering may expand across the Trust.
We are looking at coming out of the Croydon Council energy contract as we would be able to get a better deal as a Trust with other providers.
11 / ANY FUTUE ESSENTIAL WORKS
The Hall is undergoing lots of essential works. This is a result of work that was carried out on the boiler in the half term (which was paid for by the Condition Improvement Fund). The company carried out the boiler work did not use all the funding. The conditions of the funding states you must use the fund for work you were awarded the funding for or related works. The hall floor was deemed to be related works because it was disrupted by the work carried out on the boiler installation. HofS said estimates forwork funded by the Condition Improvement Fund were not required. HofS said weagreed that the underspend from the boiler work was used to replace the hall floor,however, after agreeing this other work stemming from the boiler installation materialised and the funding had to be used for this. The school was already committed to paying and continuing the hall floor. HofS said we were told we need wider gas pipes and asbestos was found. Some of the fund was therefore used to pay for this work and we now don’t have enough to pay for complete the work on the hall floor.
HofS said this work had started and needed to be completed so the HofS approved the work and there were no estimates received as this was originally covered by the Condition Improvement Fund. This now had to be paid by the schoolbudget. We are fortunate the school has the budget to cover the cost but we would have planned to replace the hall floor next year as it was in poor condition. HofS said she had to proceed without an estimate and without governors’ approval. Governors asked if the HofS had an idea of the cost of the hall floor. HofS said (£28k)Governors said they did understand the urgency of getting this work completed but in future the HofS should be mindful that there is a process that must be followed and these actions would not be acceptable in future. HofS said other planned works should not be effected because the carry forward is expected to be more than we expected.