This weeks message comes from the Finance Director, John Lynch
I had the pleasure of attending both the London and East of England Regional meetings over the last two weeks. Both were well attended with good contributions being made at both meetings. Peter Snow, the Committee and Electoral Services Manager for Uttlesford District Council was attending his last ADSO meeting before he retires in 9 weeks’ time after nearly 47 service with the same authority! That must be getting close to a record but no doubt someone may come back and tell me they know someone with a longer service with one authority. We wish Peter a long, happy and well deserved retirement.
Our colleagues at the Centre for Public Scrutiny have been in touch asking for our help. They are running their Annual Scrutiny Survey which ask about scrutiny perceptions and impact and have asked as many people to take part as possible. There are about 2 weeks left to respond and the link to the survey is https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/annualscrutiny17
The deadline for submitting the first assignment for the new cohert of learners on our qualifications is next week and no doubt if they haven’t submitted them yet they will be busy finishing them over this weekend.
My upcoming tasks as Finance Director over the next few weeks is to finalise two papers for our forthcoming Board meeting on drawing up a Risk Register for ADSO, covering what we see as our main risks and what we are doing to mitigate these. Who would have thought all those hours I spent sitting in Councils Audit and Governance Committees might finally come in handy. The other paper will look at options for getting a return on our cash currently sitting in our bank accounts which isn’t earning any interest. We already have a large amount of money invested in fixed rate bonds and are anxious to make sure we make the best use of our cash with the lowest risk possible. So that means I won’t be investing it on the 2.45 at Kempton or in the stock market but will look at various safer options for the Board to agree.
I hope you all enjoy the sunshine this weekend. Let’s hope it lasts a bit longer.
John Lynch, Director of Finance