200306DraftFinanceCtteeMinutesV10

DRAFT MINUTES OF THE FIN­ANCE AND DELIV­ERY COM­MIT­TEE MEET­ING of

THE CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

held at the Don meet­ing room, CNPA HQ, Grant­own on Spey on 6 March 2020 at 14.15

PRESENT Wil­li­am Mun­ro (Chair) Ian McLar­en (Vice-Chair) Elean­or Mack­in­tosh John Kirk Anne Rae Macdonald

In Attend­ance: Grant Moir, CEO Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices Danie Ral­ph, Fin­ance Man­ager Pete Crane, Head of Vis­it­or Ser­vices Alix Hark­ness, Clerk to the Board

Apo­lo­gies: Xan­der McDade

Wel­come and Apologies

1. Every­one was wel­comed to the meeting.

Minutes of Last Meet­ing – Approval

1. The draft Minutes of the meet­ings on 11 Octo­ber 2019 were approved with no amendments.

Mat­ters Arising

1. The Chair provided an update on the Action Points from the pre­vi­ous meet­ing includ­ing: a) At Para 13i) – Closed – Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices raised that the TGLP Board needed sight of the fin­an­cial over­view of the pro­ject from the Com­mit­tee to Peter May­hew and Will Boyd Wal­lis. An intern­al steer­ing group had been formed which was being chaired by the Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices which

4.

was looking at the finances of TGLP Programme and to ensure the legacy board
would be established with procedures in place to assist with both the close down
and the legacy fund.

b) At Para 13ii) – In Hand – TGLP pro­ject over­view paper will be brought to the

next meeting.

The Com­mit­tee made the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions: a) Elean­or Mack­in­tosh, TGLP Board Mem­ber, com­men­ted that there was now a

definite focus on finance within the TGLP Board and from the team supporting
the TGLP Board and programme.

b) Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that there was the pos­sib­il­ity of a short

extension of up to 3 months as more financial information had been
forthcoming.

c) CEO explained that the focus had shif­ted and was now on deliv­er­ing TGLP

outcomes as agreed with key funders and not solely on delivering individual
projects.

d) Were there any les­sons learned that could be taken for­ward? CEO advised that

lessons learned had just taken place on the Capercaillie project and would be
carried out for this project and the lessons learned from both would be fed into
the Heritage Horizon's bid. He added that it would be vital going forward to
ensure partners were explicit about what resources they would commit over
the lifetime of the project.

e) Com­ment made that it had been a very com­plex pro­ject. f) Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices added that one of the les­sons learned would be

around catching disconnects between project delivery teams and central systems
early and to drive one finance system rather the duplicate systems which are
present to an extent in this project.

g) The Chair added that the longer term aspir­a­tion would be that financial

responsibilities for legacy actions are contained within the Authority as the
accountable body, while recognising that a partnership body will be needed to
continue to have overall oversight of maintaining the TGLP impacts throughout
the legacy period.

h) Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices added that they learned that going for­ward the

administrative side of the project should be kept within the Authority while the
project officers were delivering their objectives. This would assist with the full
team dynamic between existing staff and CNPA systems and project delivery
oriented staff.

Declar­a­tion of Interests

1. No interests were declared.

Rela­tion­ship with Out­door Access Trust for Scot­land (OATS) (Paper 2)

1. The Con­vener pro­posed to take this paper first. The Com­mit­tee agreed.

2. Pete Crane, Head of Vis­it­or Ser­vices, intro­duced Paper 2 which presents a review of the Authority’s rela­tion­ship with the Out­door Access Trust for Scot­land (OATS), includ­ing a present­a­tion of pro­posed amend­ments to the charity’s Art­icles of Asso­ci­ation sug­ges­ted to the Author­ity as a mem­ber of the char­ity by the OATS Trust­ees. Pete high­lighted that a pro­posed Memor­andum of Under­stand­ing had been drawn up to estab­lish an appro­pri­ate set out work­ing arrange­ments and com­mu­nic­a­tions between the Author­ity and OATS, which would high­light the Authority’s expect­a­tions as a mem­ber of the char­ity. Over­all, the ana­lys­is of staff involved in this area of work is that the Author­ity should remain a mem­ber of OATS at least for the remainder of the cur­rent Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan period.

3. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that he is a Trust­ee of OATS but with no con­flict of interest as he is not involved in decision-mak­ing today in his advis­ory capa­city to the Com­mit­tee. In addi­tion to the mode of oper­a­tions covered by Pete, he high­lighted that the sug­ges­ted changes to the charity’s Art­icles of Asso­ci­ation by the Trust­ees sought to update the doc­u­ment to bet­ter reflect OATS’ cur­rent cir­cum­stances. Officers’ ana­lys­is was that the doc­u­ment might bet­ter and more expli­citly reflect the charity’s com­mit­ment to main­ten­ance of paths in addi­tion to their cap­it­al invest­ment focus in build­ing and rein­stat­ing paths.

4. CEO advised that for leg­acy issues it was import­ant to remain a mem­ber of OATS, and would not want the rev­en­ue brought in from the car park at Loch Muick to be spent on Skye for example. He added that for next 2 years it would be wise for the Author­ity to remain mem­bers to ensure hav­ing a voice in the paths they are constructing.

5. The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions: a) It was con­firmed that the CNPA no longer provides OATS with Cor­por­ate Ser­vices sup­port. b) Con­cern raised that the art­icles of asso­ci­ation appears to be focussed on cap­it­al invest­ment and the inten­tion to build and walk away. Sug­ges­tion made to ask that they add ​‘and main­tain as appro­pri­ate’ to the end of the rel­ev­ant sen­tence of the art­icles. c) The need for the CNPA Board Mem­ber who sits on the OATS board to be adequately briefed to have the most influ­ence with regard to main­ten­ance of

paths and rev­en­ue obtained in the Nation­al Park to be spent in the Nation­al Park.

1. The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee: a) Determ­ined views on the appro­pri­ate­ness of the pro­posed changes in

   the Articles of Association of OATS
   

   b) Con­sidered the pre­ferred future rela­tion­ship between the Authority

   and OATS given the nature of the work to be undertaken over the
   remaining 2 years of current NPPP
   

   c) Con­sidered and agreed the appro­pri­ate­ness of the proposed

   Memorandum of Understanding with OATS
   

   d) Agreed the Authority’s ongo­ing mem­ber­ship of OATS for at least the

   next two years.
   

2. Pete Crane left the meeting.

3. Action: i. OATS to be asked to more expli­citly reflect the com­mit­ment to path main­ten­ance, poten­tially by adding the words “…and main­tain as appro­pri­ate” at the end of the sen­tence of the pro­posed Art­icles of Association.

Fin­ance Mon­it­or­ing: 10 months to 31 Janu­ary 2020 (Paper 1)

1. Danie Ral­ph, Fin­ance Man­ager, intro­duced the paper which presents a sum­mary review of income and expendit­ure for the 10 months to 31 Janu­ary 2020, togeth­er with a pro­jec­ted out­turn for the ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ fin­an­cial year.

2. The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions: a) Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that the bot­tom line out­turn pro­jec­tion was around £20k under­spent at this point, how­ever they were con­fid­ent they would man­age to reach a closer to break­even pos­i­tion by the end of March. b) The CEO remarked that the Oper­a­tion­al Plan is £Im at com­mence­ment of the year but the spend had been doubled through the year with extern­al invest­ment sup­port, which was a cred­it to all the teams who found the match fund­ing to deliver.

3. c) The Con­vener asked what the recov­ery of leg­al fees referred to? The CEO

   explained that it was associated with planning e.g. S75's where legal fees
   incurred by CNPA were recovered from the applicant.
   

   d) Con­cern raised that there would be an over­spend in Board fees and Board

   expenses given that the Board fee policy on attendance was changed in October
   2019. Director of Corporate Services provided the reassurance that the budget
   had been increased to allow for that and a virement had been made from
   elsewhere. The Finance Manager added that the Board and Staff costs are put
   together for the purposes of SG reporting.
   

   e) A Mem­ber com­men­ted that going for­ward the Board costs should decrease

   given that there was less informal meeting dates planned and therefore less
   overnight accommodation costs associated with this. Director of Corporate
   Services agreed and added that the total budgeted for other costs associated
   with Board and governance would remain the same next year to account for
   Board mileage costs.
   

   f) Giv­en the pre­dicted £20k under­spend could it be spent on IT facil­it­ies for

   example video-conferencing? CEO confirmed that staff were able to video
   conference from their desks and there are the facilities in the Board room. He
   explained that the issue in the Ballater office was the bandwidth.
   

   g) Would there be some work ahead with for­ward phas­ing? Dir­ect­or of Corporate

   Services advised that in the final quarter they would look at pre-existing
   commitments together with bringing work forward. He added that reserves
   could not be carried into the next year to give flexibility. Opportunities would
   be taken with any assessed underspend to undertake management of multi-year
   investments and maximise 19/20 resource utilisation while creating flexibilities
   where possible for 20/21 budget investments.
   

   h) Had the increase in pen­sion costs determ­ined by the Treas­ury dur­ing the course

   of the year been budgeted for? Director of Corporate Services advised that
   when the budget was approved in March 2019 the cost had to be absorbed. He
   explained that when the £117k was reimbursed some of the activities that had
   been cut out were reinstated.
   

   i) Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that he had atten­ded the LEADER

   accountable bodies Board a couple of weeks ago and their Service Level
   Agreement states that they will pay us within 90 days from when we submit a
   claim. Scottish Government's team recognise the delay in paying to date and
   have committed to accountable bodies to seek to pay what is owed in LEADER
   grants by the end of March or early April.
   

   j) It was noted that the descrip­tion on the left hand side of Annex I was missing.

   Agreed to reinstate and recirculate.
   

   The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee noted the out­turn for the 10 months to 31 Janu­ary, 2020 and the pro­jec­ted out­turn for the year.

4. Action:

i. Left hand side descrip­tion of what the lines meant to be added to

Annex I and for it to be recirculated and put on the web.

²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ Budget Devel­op­ment (Paper 3)

1. Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices intro­duced Paper 3 which presents the cur­rent pos­i­tion on devel­op­ment of the Authority’s budget for the ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ fin­an­cial year.

2. The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee dis­cussed the paper and made the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions: a) The CEO advised that only a few things were likely to change over the next year, for example, deer count for the South­ern Cairngorms. If the Her­it­age Hori­zons bid is suc­cess­ful it would not impact of this year’s budget but would on next years’. For the Form­al Board meet­ing later this month, expendit­ure pro­pos­als would be put against spe­cif­ic lines with­in the Authority’s deliv­ery themes with the caveat emphas­ised that very few activ­it­ies affect only one area of the budget as they more often span across mul­tiple areas of work and con­trib­ute to mul­tiple object­ives. He added that Oper­a­tion­al Plan pro­pos­als will total £1.2m use of Grant in Aid, while likely again exceed­ing £2m when match fund­ing con­tri­bu­tions are accoun­ted for. b) Giv­en agri­cul­tur­al land use issues, could peat­land posts fund­ing com­ing dir­ectly to us instead of us apply­ing from SNH? CEO advised that some money had been budgeted, but more about staff time to put in to it. He advised that it would be a big area of work. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices high­lighted that as part of the Agri­cul­tur­al Bill and the Com­munity-led loc­al devel­op­ment fund­ing com­ing out of that staff time would also need to be put into pur­su­ing replace­ment of LEAD­ER fund­ing which links to those legis­lat­ive reviews. c) Con­cern raised with regards to the dif­fi­culty in recruit­ing to the Plan­ning team and failed attempts to recruit agency staff. The issue being that the Author­ity does not boast the same career pro­gres­sion oppor­tun­it­ies as the cent­ral belt. Con­cern with the work­load if the cur­rent Head of Plan­ning were to go off sick. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that the Staff­ing & Recruit­ment Com­mit­tee had done some work look­ing at the pay remit pro­cess and were con­sid­er­ing to increase the min­im­um and max­im­um points of each band­width sub­ject to pay remit guid­ance. This may assist with recruit­ment in some instances, while oth­er recruit­ment activ­it­ies are typ­ic­ally successful.

3. d) How are decisions made on what the min­im­um and max­im­um of band­widths should be? Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that they had moved away from fixed incre­ment­al steps with­in bands as some pay bands had up to 9 incre­ment­al points and meant staff felt pro­gress­ing was tak­ing forever. From a Budget man­age­ment point of view the con­trac­tu­al com­mit­ment is per­form­ance related. He added that fixed steps were replaced with con­trac­tu­al min­im­um of 1.5% pro­gres­sion. Last year and this year a little more had been alloc­ated into the budget for pro­gres­sion to help ensure staff achieved their band max­im­um with­in the Authority’s tar­get times. He explained that the Author­ity are a rel­at­ively rur­al organ­isa­tion, and while the stand­ard offer to pre­ferred can­did­ates is to start at the bot­tom of the advert­ised salary band, nego­ti­ation of a high­er start point does fre­quently take place. e) Cla­ri­fic­a­tion reques­ted on what the pay struc­ture was. CEO advised that there is little room for manœuvre, the Author­ity and the Staff­ing & Recruit­ment Com­mit­tee imple­ment what we are asked to do by the Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment. The CEO explained how each Board Com­mit­tee inter­acts. Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices added that Loch Lomond and Trossachs Nation­al Park and Cairngorms had a shared pay struc­ture, fol­low­ing a busi­ness case for the organ­isa­tion and has had Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment endorse­ment. f) Were there any vacancy con­cerns? Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices advised that only the Land Man­ager Adviser post was cur­rently vacant. g) Was there a mar­ket for try­ing to get more exper­i­enced people at the end of their careers to come and settle in a post? CEO advised that those types of people usu­ally work for agen­cies, the issue with plan­ning is that there is a lack of plan­ners in Scot­land. He added that the Author­ity were talk­ing to gradu­ate plan­ning schools but that would take a num­ber of years to get off the ground.

The Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee: a) Con­sidered the update on the estim­ated budget pos­i­tion for ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ b) Con­sidered wheth­er any aspects of the budget mer­it further

consideration in the development of final proposals to be presented to
the Board in March.

Actions: None.

AOCB There were no items presented.

Date of Next Meeting

1. The next sched­uled Fin­ance and Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee meet­ing will take place on Fri­day 22 May 2020 in Nethy Bridge. There was a pro­vi­sion­al earli­er Fin­ance & Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee meet­ing sched­uled for 24 April 2020 in Bal­later should UK budget decisions and con­sequent Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment action require any sub­sequent recon­sid­er­a­tion of the Authority’s budget position.

2. The meet­ing fin­ished at 16.00 hours.