Moscow and St. Petersburg have been added to my travel experience over the summer and the Hermitage was stunning, with world artists and all sorts of treasurers vying for attention. Unusually, SAGA travel, (Sex and Games Abroad) got quite a few things wrong and several clients have decided not to travel with them again.

Back home, it took days to get to grips with the emails and correspondence and then it was council business as usual with an Audit Committee meeting scheduled for 24th September. The papers were a heavy read although lightened by the exclusion of A & D Waste and Clwyd Theatr Cymru accounts. Flintshire’s external auditors, PricewaterhouseCoopers were unfazed by these omissions. After some heavy mutterings, things are only going to get better as our chief Executive has engaged someone to look carefully at how this waste business is operated. (Long overdue in the opinion of several people I represent!). (more…)

At a recent Community and Housing meeting, I was cross to learn that progress was behind schedule when rolling out a computerised means of council tenants reporting faults which, when up and running should make big savings and speed up the maintenance service. When visiting Canton, the Housing and Maintenance HQ some weeks ago, we saw a system that seemed to be working well and I was impressed. Tenants are issued with a computerised manual to make reporting a fault much easier to identify so that the fault can be fully logged and agreed without the need to send work people to identify the problem before a repair can be effected. The reason for the delay to this project was not made clear and we also learned of slippage on a system designed to track the whereabouts of all council transport. Again, the reason for the delay was vague! This scheme also has the potential to make big savings and so any delay in introducing it is regrettable. (more…)