CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee Paper 4 08/03/19

1. CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY AUDIT & RISK COMMITTEE FOR DECISION

Title: DRAFT GOV­ERNANCE STATEMENT

Pre­pared by: DANIE RAL­PH, FIN­ANCE MANAGER

Pur­pose

To present the draft Gov­ernance State­ment for incor­por­a­tion in the Authority’s Annu­al Accounts for ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉.

Recom­mend­a­tions

The Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee is asked to:

a) Endorse the draft Gov­ernance State­ment for inclu­sion in the Authority’s ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ Annu­al Accounts.

Exec­ut­ive Summary

1. An ele­ment of the Committee’s remit is to provide advice to the Account­able Officer on their com­ple­tion of the Gov­ernance State­ment, which forms part of the wider Cor­por­ate Gov­ernance sec­tion of the Account­ab­il­ity Report in the Authority’s annu­al accounts.

2. The Scot­tish Pub­lic Fin­ance Manu­al states that there is no set format for a gov­ernance state­ment and lists the fol­low­ing ​“essen­tial features:”

a) The gov­ernance frame­work of the organ­isa­tion, includ­ing inform­a­tion about the com­mit­tee struc­ture of the gov­ern­ing board (or equi­val­ent) and the cov­er­age of its work. b) The oper­a­tion of the gov­ern­ing board (or equi­val­ent) dur­ing the peri­od; c) An assess­ment of cor­por­ate gov­ernance with ref­er­ence to com­pli­ance with gen­er­ally accep­ted best prac­tice prin­ciples and rel­ev­ant guid­ance, and explan­a­tions where a dif­fer­ent approach has been adop­ted. d) An assess­ment of the organisation’s risk man­age­ment arrange­ments and risk pro­file, includ­ing, sub­ject to a pub­lic interest test, details of sig­ni­fic­ant risk-related mat­ters arising dur­ing the peri­od. e) A record of any writ­ten author­it­ies provided to the Account­able Officer; and f) Details of any sig­ni­fic­ant lapses of data security.

1. As the State­ment cov­ers the aspects of gov­ernance and intern­al con­trol sys­tems with­in the remit of the Audit Committee’s work over the course of the year, it is appro­pri­ate that the Com­mit­tee con­sider its con­tent and advise on its accur­acy on the basis of mem­bers’ exper­i­ence over the course of the year, pri­or to its inclu­sion in draft accounts.

Danie Ral­ph 26 Feb­ru­ary 2019 danielrlaph@​cairngorms.​co.​uk