Welsh Auditor General slams “lax” town council

The Auditor General for Wales has made a scathing attack on members of Maesteg Town Council over “prolonged poor governance and financial management” that enabled its clerk to carry out a fraud for which she has been jailed.

Councillors both presided over a lax system and threatened the integrity of the fraud investigation by leaking confidential information, auditor general Adrian Crompton found.

His public interest report said that between March 2016 and December 2019, former council clerk Margaret Buckley defrauded the council of £238,000, equivalent to up to 27% of its total non-pay expenditure in each financial year.

Ms Buckley was jailed this week for two years and four months after pleading guilty at Cardiff Crown Court, the BBC has reported.

The report said of councillors: “Council members serving during the former clerk’s tenure failed to properly scrutinise the financial information presented by the former clerk.

“As part of their financial and governance arrangements, the council required all cheques to be signed by members, who should also have checked all invoices. However, members who were cheque signatories failed to follow proper process, including signing blank cheques, therefore facilitating the fraud committed by the former clerk.”

There was no adequate internal audit system prior to 2019 and significant inconsistencies and omissions were found in the council’s accounting systems and records.

Mr Crompton said some councillors had put information into the public domain “at a time that could have adversely affected the criminal investigation”.

He said councillors asked Ms Buckley’s successor to place an internal audit report on the council’s website, a link to which was then published with comments on a local Labour party Facebook page.

“At this point in time, the police investigation was in its early stages,” the auditor said. “It was therefore wholly inappropriate for members to have published information concerning the investigation and to have publicly commented on it.

“To limit any further inappropriate publication of confidential information and to limit adverse consequences, both South Wales Police and my audit team advised [the new clerk] not to provide members with any further detailed information regarding the fraud.”

The report said that of the fraud proceeds, Ms Buckley gave £134,895 to a fundraising group associated with Our Lady and St Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church, £18,866 to the church itself, kept £84,445 for herself and family members and gave £615 to a supplier to a community group.

Apart from Ms Buckley herself, the auditor said he was unaware “of any knowledge of wrongdoing on the part the recipients of these payments”.

He said his recommendations on tighter financial controls were measures “town councils across Wales can learn from to minimise the risk of this happening again”.