Audit Wales has unveiled plans to improve the timeliness of its performance audit work at NHS and local government bodies and to restore the auditing of accounts of the 800 public bodies across Wales to pre-pandemic timescales over the next few years. In its Action Plan for 2024-25 the watchdog acknowledged that the public sector in Wales…
James Goudie KC will no longer conduct an independent review into social media posts made by an officer at the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales after concerns were voiced about the barrister’s ties to the Labour party. Goudie, who has been head of chambers at 11KBW for almost three decades, was set to lead an…
Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council What Do They Know The Information Commissioner, John Edwards, has written an open letter to public organisations to remind them that “transparency is essential” and resources must be dedicated to access to information. This comes as the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has taken regulatory action against five public authorities for “continued…
The Auditor General for Wales has called for public services in Wales to be streamlined in order to “escape from a spiral of short-term firefighting” and boost financial resilience. In a statement responding to the Welsh Government’s draft 2024-25 budget earlier this month, the Auditor General, Adrian Crompton, said costs would be reduced by tackling…
Campaigners who threatened a judicial review over an alleged failure by Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council to stop a coal mining operation after its planning permission expired have withdrawn their legal challenge. Coal Action Network (CAN), which had support from the Good Law Project, ended its judicial review challenge against the local authority and the…
The Independent Monitoring Authority (IMA) has announced it is “assured” that all 22 local authorities in Wales have confirmed they have “appropriate measures in place” to ensure the rights of eligible EU and EEA EFTA looked after children and care leavers are protected. In October 2022, the IMA launched a review of local authorities across…
Local authorities in Wales could face a funding gap of £744m in two years’ time, according to a report from Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre. The report, which considers the medium-term fiscal outlook for Welsh local government, suggests that the use of reserves, higher than 5% Council Tax increases, and further funding from the Welsh Government…
The Welsh Government is to run a pilot programme ahead of implementing automatic voter registration across Wales. Plans to register Welsh voters automatically were first consulted upon in October 2022 and will now be part of a Bill scheduled to be introduced in the next few weeks, according to the Welsh Government. The Bill, which…
Audit Wales has said that local councils have made “major changes” to how and where their staff work, but need to build on their experience of the pandemic and “develop their strategic approaches” to plan for the longer term. In its report, Springing forward: lessons from our work on workforce and assets, Audit Wales looked at…
A Bridgend County Borough Council councillor has been suspended for three months following an investigation by the Welsh Ombudsman concluded that he had provided misleading information to residents while raising funds for a legal challenge against a planning application. Bridgend found that Cllr Sean Aspey had breached the Code of Conduct as a result of…
