NHSCFA Board meeting 24th May 2018

Meeting date: 24 May 2018

Meeting Venue: 4th Floor Skipton House

Meeting title: NHSCFA Board meeting

Attendees:

(SH) Simon Hughes (Interim Chair, NHSCFA) (Chair)
(DR) David Rawsthorn (Interim Non Executive Director, NHSCFA)
(MJB) Matthew Jordan-Boyd (Interim Director of Finance, NHSCFA)
(SR) Susan Frith (Interim Chief Executive, NHSCFA)
(AS) Ann Sturgess (Corporate Governance Manager and Board Secretary, NHSCFA)
(RR) Richard Rippin (Head of Operations, NHSCFA)
(DT) Davina Teeluck ( Staff Engagement Group representative – Observer) Additional Attendees to deliver the NAO presentation
(CH) Catherine Hepburn (National Audit Office)
(EB) Ele Brown (National Audit Office)

Apologies:

(MR) Mark Richardson (Interim Deputy Director, Department of Health and Social Care Anti Fraud Unit)
(RH) Richard Hampton (Head of Intelligence and Crime Reduction, NHSCFA)

1. Introduction

1.1 SH welcomed all to the NHSCFA Board meeting.

2. Declarations of interest

2.1 A verbal declaration of interest was made by DR to confirm he is currently a Non Executive Director (NED) at North Cumbria University Hospitals Trust.

3. Minutes and action from NHSCFA Board meeting held 15.02.18

3.1 The minutes of the last NHSCFA Board meeting on 22 March 2018 were agreed.

3.2 The following was noted in relation to action points from 22 March 2018

Action point 1: List of actions arising from future Board meetings to be circulated in conjunction with the minutes.	Completed	10.5.18.
point 2: Named senior executive on Board to be responsible for data and cyber to be agreed at the next Board meeting.	Agreed by the Board this will be MJB	24.5.18
Action point 3: MR to liaise with Ministers Private Secretary and advise SMT of information requested from NHSCFA.	SF liaising on a regular basis with MR	24.5.18
Action point 4: formal thanks to be provided to Arun Chauhan for facilitating the NHSCFA staff conference.	Email sent and acknowledged.	23.3.18

3.3 It was noted there were no other outstanding action points from previous meetings.
3.4 The Board agreed in the future the action log would be updated to show the owner of each action and target date for completion. Action Point 1 - Amend action log to include the owner and target date for completion.

Reports and matters arising

4. Operational Performance update

4.1 SF presented the Operational Performance update in respect of Q4.
4.2 SF confirmed the statistics in Slide 1 will be amended to reflect the updated position from when the information was circulated. The content was accepted subject to this amendment.
4.3 The Board discussed the need to analyse & evaluate the quantity and quality of fraud referrals to allow swift evaluation in order to allow agile communications campaigns.
4.4 The Board noted that data sharing was now in progress with the NHSBSA and acknowledged the role of the Board to support the building of relationships with stakeholders.
4.5 SF highlighted the cultural changes now being experienced by staff regarding the level of accountability required and increased scrutiny. SH noted this and highlighted the need to ensure staff development is in place to ensure staff are supported and have transparency in their levels of responsibility. MJB confirmed additional support will be provided in relation to budget management.

5. Operations Report (investigations)

5.1 RR presented the operations report which was noted.
5.2 The Board noted the Commendations of the judge in respect of Operation Lynx
5.3 DR requested that future reports include a brief statistical summary of the number of cases in progress, number of new cases and number of cases closed. Action Point 2 - RR to include a brief statistical summary of number of cases in progress, number of new and closed cases in future Operations reports.

6. Strategic Intelligence Assessment (SIA)

6.1 SF provided an update regarding the SIA. The letter is with the Minister for sign off in preparation to send to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and publication. It is anticipated publication will be within a week.
6.2 SF requested the Board consider if NHSCFA will publish the document if the progression to the PAC does not occur within the anticipated timescale.
6.3 The Board agreed the progress will be monitored and noted the link to the Annual Report which refers to this information. Action point 3 – AS to monitor progress of the SIA publication as the Annual report is finalised.
6.4 SH requested the NHSCFA publication scheme is amended to reflect the now annual publication of the SIA and its link to the Annual Report. The SIA will be published by NHSCFA 1 month after it is issued to the DH & SC AFU. Action point 4 - NHSCFA publication scheme is amended to reflect that in the future the SIA will be published by NHSCFA 1 month after it is issued to the DH & SC AFU.
6.5 SH requested a formal invite is extended to the new DH & SC AFU Deputy Director, who is due to commence in post in early June to ensure there is representation from the DH & SC AFU at future NHSCFA Board meetings. Action Point 5 - AS to issue a welcome and formal invite to attend NHSCFA Board meetings to the new DHSC AFU Deputy Director.
6.6 SF confirmed a meeting with the NHSCFA, NHSBSA and DH & SC AFU on 18.06.18 to further discuss data sharing.
6.7 SF highlighted ongoing ministerial interest in the opportunities the work delivered by NHSCFA presents across the wider healthcare arena.

7. Quality Assessments Report

7.1 SF presented the Quality Assessments report which was noted.
7.2 SH sought clarification on the relationship between the Quality Assessments and the reduction in concrete fraud activity. RR confirmed the Self Review Tool reflects how organisations are set up to address fraud but does not specifically drive improvements. SF confirmed this was an area currently being reviewed and the unit business plan will reflect activity in this area. SH requested that an update on the additional activity is provided to the next Board meeting and specifically how the QA integrate with work across the NHS CFA to drive down fraudulent activity. Action Point 6 – Quality to provide a report for the next Board meeting to show what activities in the unit business plan for 18/19 have been identified & delivery dates, which will demonstrate how the Quality Assessments will integrate with work across the NHS CFA to drive down fraudulent activity.

8. GDPR update

8.1 AS provided an update on GDPR preparations which was noted. AS confirmed the privacy notice was being updated and confirmation of this would be placed on the external NHSCFA website. AS confirmed the guidance information on the secure NHSCFA ‘Extranet’ required amending to remove outdated documents. Action point 7 - AS to liaise with the Fraud Prevention Unit to ensure all outstated documents are removed from Extranet.

9. NAO presentation

9.1 The Board noted the informative presentation regarding the work delivered by the NAO presented by CH and EB.
9.2 The Board thanked CH and EB for taking the time to deliver this personally.
9.3 AS requested confirmation that the presentation slides could be shared with the Senor Management Team (SMT) and Leadership Team (LT) which was agreed. Action point 8 - AS to share the NAO presentation slides with SMT & LT.
9.4 DR raised a matter arising from the ARC see 14.1 regarding the sign off of the Annual Report & Accounts. The Board confirmed it has formally delegated the function of signing off the annual report and accounts to the Audit & Risk Committee (ARC) planned for 13.7.18. The Terms of Reference (ToR) and ARC forward planner will be reviewed to clarify this process for 19/20 with ARC meeting dates being set to facilitate this. Action point 9 – Review the ARC ToR to specifically reflect the delegated functions regarding signing off the annualaria-label report and Accounts.

10. IT outage

10.1 The Board noted the paper outlining the events leading to the recent IT outage and the actions taken to restore systems.
10.2 The Board agreed it would be helpful to have further information regarding IT information at the next Board Training event. Action point 10 - AS to arrange a presentation at the next Board training event.

11. Finance report

11.1 MJB presented the Finance report which was discussed and noted.

12. Annual report & accounts

12.1 RR presented the latest version of the Annual Report. It was noted the delay to present a final version of this to the ARC on 15.5.18 was due to the NHSBSA not providing the financial information within the required timescale. AS confirmed the report will be sent to the NAO for auditing purposes on 25.5.18. The report is still subject to final editing and graphical formatting. Final sign off is provisionally arranged for the ARC on 13.7.18.

13. Corporate Risks

13.1 AS confirmed the risks were fully reviewed by the ARC on 15.05.18.

14. Audit & Risk Committee minutes

14.1 DR presented the ARC minutes from 15.05.18 and raised the following matters which had been highlighted as Matters for the Board. These were all noted.
- The ‘limited’ assurance in the internal audit Key Financial Controls internal audit report.
- The accounts were not produced for ARC’s approval
- There was no quarter 4 budget monitoring report.