Feeding Frenzy

It was an admin day today, the only time I went out was to bring in the recycling bin and to top up the sunflower hearts and take a photo for blip. I've never seen so many great and blue tits queueing up for food, there must have been 10-15 on the feeder or in the tree / on the fence waiting - usually there would be a couple. Sounds like Greshams are starting work on the trees in the field. I spent most of the day doing admin and getting my document 'grab bag' sorted - nearly there.

Post Office Scandal (for my record) 
This morning I read an article on the BBC news website about the Post Office scandal, and the following caught my attention:
-  A barrister had warned senior Post Office managers a number of prosecutions might be unsafe because of bugs in the system that had not been disclosed in court cases against the sub-postmasters (2012?)
 - A report by consultants Ernst and Young sent to Post Office directors in 2011 warned that Fujitsu staff had "unrestricted access" to sub-postmasters' accounts, that "may lead to the processing of unauthorised or erroneous transactions".

 So I had a quick look at the Post Office Accounts for 2015 /16 (on the jfsa.org.uk website). What I noted was:
 - CEO statement (Paula Vennells) A big emphasis was put on the ongoing reduction in operating losses. 
- Corporate Governance Overview - As a Government owned entity we are committed to act in accordance with the Nolan Principles of Public Life, namely: selflessness; integrity; objectivity; accountability; openness; honesty; and leadership.
 - Accounts - Contingent Liabilities extracts - A High Court claim has been issued on behalf of a number of postmasters against Post Office in relation to various legal, technical, and operational matters. Full particulars of the claim (including as to quantum) have not yet been received by Post Office. The Directors do not consider the outcome of any claim or action will have a material adverse impact on the Consolidated position of the Group.

 In risk management terms, as well as managers in the first line of defence such as in presumably an IT Dept, Finance, Investigations etc, there was a second line of defence with a Head of Risk and a Risk and Compliance Committee chaired by the General Counsel (potentially a Legal not risk expert???) which reported to the Group Executive. I also saw that they said that controls included Senior management remuneration designed to align personal and business objectives, as well as to discourage dishonest, illegal or unethical acts. Also a whistleblowing procedure was in place.  Their Principal Risks and Mitigations were quite broad and generic e.g. reliance on third parties, IT transformation not delivered in full, financial reporting and controls failure. (These are pretty much standard operational risks in most organisation’s Risk Map i.e. IT Risk, Change Risk, Third Party Risk and Financial Reporting Risk - not specific risks).

As would be expected there was a third line of defence with a Head of Internal Audit (some work was co-sourcing with PwC) which reported to an Audit, Risk and Compliance Committee (normally just called the Audit Committee) which reported to the Board. This was chaired by a Non-Executive Director and there were four different Chairs in that year including seemingly the Post Office Chairman himself for 3 months . They considered the external auditors to have an appropriate level of independence. During that year 19% of the total fees paid to Ernst & Young LLP were for non-audit services, a decrease on the 29% paid in 2014/15.