Issue - meetings

Purpose: the report presents the Council’s Risk Management Strategy for the future. It is important that the Council has an overarching strategy for how it manages risk; risk can never be eradicated, but it is important that the Council is clear on how it proposes to manage different risks. This report proposes a changed risk management matrix to a ‘5x5’ matrix as well as a new Risk Appetite.

Members asked about the public Strategic Risk Register Q2 2024/25 report (Item 9) as this was not available at that time in the agenda pack. The Monitoring Officer confirmed that there had been issues uploading this report to the website and that it would be provided to the public as soon as possible. It was confirmed that Members had access to the full report, including the Part II details, which would be discussed under Item 11.

The Committee considered a report (Agenda Item 7) concerning the Risk Management Strategy for the years 2024-2027.

The Monitoring Officer and Interim Executive Director (Resources) introduced the report and highlighted that the Strategy was approved by the Council’s Executive on 12 December 2024. Having an approved Risk Management Strategy was essential for the Council’s Risk Management Framework as it ensured that the Council was taking risk informed decisions.

The key changes on the previous Strategy were the adoption of a five-by-five matrix, in line with industry standards, which would present a broader variation of how risks were managed. In addition, the risk appetite had been updated and now varied between flexible to open. Training sessions would be set up to help inform Officers about this change to the Council’s risk appetite. The Monitoring Officer highlighted these training sessions were necessary as she believed that Officer’s views of risk appetite were often different than the actual corporate risk appetite.

The Committee noted that the new Strategy would help inform the risks that would be brought to them through the regular risk register update items, starting from quarter four 2024/25.

Members inquired into the difference between Officers views about risk appetite and the actual appetite of the Council and the Monitoring Office indicated that, through her experience, there was a belief that the Council was more risk averse than was defined in the Strategy. This Risk Management Strategy 2024-2027, and the training, would clarify exactly where risk was accepted and where it should be mitigated or avoided.

On a question about if the Council believed that risks could be managed, rather than avoided, the Monitoring Officer indicated that the Council considered the impacts of all the risks on the Register and those with the greatest potential impact would look to be avoided wherever possible. Members were assured that the risk register was a live and flexible document, reported to the Committee every quarter, and that the Council had five options to approach risk which were set out in the report as the five T’s – treatment, transfer, tolerate, terminate, or take the opportunity. The Monitoring Officer confirmed that these options could be made clearer to Members and Officers.

Overall, as the Committee was satisfied with the report, they agreed to note the Risk Management Strategy.