Lapse leaves council with £4,387 telephone bill from ex-members

But official pledges financial checks are working well

By Iain ramage

Published:

Highland Council’s new budget chief has pledged that a lapse which landed the authority with a £4,387 phone bill from former councillors will not be repeated.

The revelation surfaced following a review of the authority’s annual financial planning for 2007/08.

Nigel Rose, head of internal audit and risk management, said the investigation was prompted by last year’s introduction of salaries for councillors across Scotland.

“Overall, the systems are operating satisfactorily,” he said, although he admitted there were two areas of concern.

“Telephone lines for former members were not disconnected properly and some equipment of a nominal value was not disposed of in strict accordance with the council’s financial regulations,” he said.

The belated phone bill was amassed by 40 former councillors, two of whom left office more than four years ago.

The council paid £1,610 for the cost of two former councillors’ land lines, despite their respective resignations in 2003 and 2004.

Mr Rose confirmed that high-value assets, including personal computers, laptops and printers had been returned by councillors who left through retirement or severance, or who had failed to be re-elected.

However, other equipment lent to councillors, including five dictation machines and filing cabinets, have not been.

He said that was partly due to the “nominal value” of the items, “in view of the fact that the members had served for an average nine years” which had resulted in the equipment being assessed as “obsolete” or “worthless”.

The respective phone lines have since been disconnected and accounts prepared for them. Councillors are funded a land line and a mobile phone for council business.

Mr Rose insisted the issue would not be repeated because a new system was in place.

The authority’s new “budget leader”, David Alston, said: “It shows the value of doing this through internal audit because it picked something up. I think we just have to hold our hands up as a council and say this is something that shouldn’t have happened.”