Audit and Risk Committee Minutes 17 December 2021

Minutes of the meeting of the Cardiff University Audit and Risk Committee held on Friday 17 December 2021 by Zoom, at 14:00.

Present: Michael Hampson (Chair), Dónall Curtin, Dr Janet Wademan, Agnes Xavier-Phillips.

Apologised: Paul Benjamin and Rashi Jain

In Attendance: Professor Colin Riordan (Vice-Chancellor); Laura Hallez (Senior Risk Advisor), Katy Dale (Minute-taker), Alison Jarvis (Director of Financial Operations), Faye Lloyd (Head of Internal Audit), Claire Rawls (University Lawyer), Ruth Robertson (Head of Corporate Governance); Claire Sanders (Chief Operating Officer), and Robert Williams (Chief Financial Officer).

981 Welcome

The Chair welcomed Claire Rawls, University Lawyer, to the meeting.

982 Apologies for absence

Apologies were received from Paul Benjamin and Rashi Jain.

983 Declarations of interest

Noted

983.1 Rob Williams (Chief Financial Officer and member of the procurement panel) declared that he had been subject to audits by KPMG in a previous role and knows one member of the team put forward in the tender to the University, however there had been no contact between them for last 5 years.

983.2 Dónall Curtin declared that he had dealt with both firms in his professional life but that he did not know any of the individuals put forward in the tender to the University.

984 Appointment of an external auditor

Received Paper 21/352C ‘Appointment of an External Auditor’. The Chair spoke to this item.

Noted

984.1 The Chair apologised to members for the late circulation of the paper, explaining that the need to resolve a number of legal questions had added a delay.

984.2 The Chief Financial Officer presented a summary of the paper, setting out the stages that had been undertaken as part of the procurement process first initiated in April 2021, the difficult market circumstances and specific contexts that impacted on the ability to glean sufficient interest.

Noted

984.3 [Redacted]

984.4 [Redacted]

984.5 [Redacted]

984.6 [Redacted]

984.7 [Redacted]

984.8 [Redacted]

984.9 [Redacted]

948.10 [Redacted]

948.11 [Redacted]

948.12 [Redacted]

Resolved

948.13 [Redacted]

948.14 Declaration under s.489A of the Companies Act 2006

In approving the recommendation in this paper, the Audit and Risk Committee confirms that –

1. the recommendation is free from influence by a third party; and
2. no contractual term of the kind mentioned in Article 16(6) of the EU Audit Regulation has been imposed on the university.

985 Any other business

There was no other business.