The Test Valley Borough Council Audit Committee met on 22 September 2025 to review the Corporate Risk Register, receive an update on the Internal Audit Progress Report, and outline the Quality Assurance Improvement Programme. The committee noted the updated Corporate Risk Register and the Internal Audit progress report, and approved the Quality Assurance Improvement Programme.

Corporate Risk Register Update

The committee reviewed the updated Corporate Risk Register, which identifies potential barriers to achieving the council's corporate objectives and priorities. The register is maintained at both a corporate and service level to assist with the management of risks and monitoring of actions to mitigate them.

A new risk, C9, has been added to the register, addressing the potential impact of Local Government Reorganisation on the council. A dashboard showing the direction of travel for each risk has also been included with the full register, indicating that all risks remain stable or have been reduced due to implemented mitigations since the last update.

The Corporate Risk Register includes a summary dashboard which shows the risk level, direction of travel, and target risk for each identified risk. The risks identified in the register are:

• Insufficient capacity to deliver services
• Failure of internal governance arrangements
• Inability to set a balanced budget
• Inability to fulfil environmental duties and ambitions
• Inability to deliver Corporate Plan priorities and objectives
• Inability to deliver services following a major incident or cyber attack
• Inability to deliver major projects within budget / on time
• Inability to deliver government's changes to planning system and increased housing requirements
• Local Government Re-Organisation

The committee resolved to note the updated Corporate Risk Register.

Internal Audit Progress Report

The committee received an update on the work undertaken by the Internal Audit team in 2025/26. Jan Balfour, Internal Audit Manager, presented the Internal Audit Progress Report, which provided an overview of the audit coverage, findings, and performance for the year to date, as well as summary risk profiles for the areas reviewed.

The report detailed the status of the 2025/26 audit plan, noting that 7 out of 30 reviews (23%) had been completed, 2 (7%) were at the draft report stage, 7 (23%) were in progress, and 14 (47%) were yet to be started. All six completed audits were classified as providing substantial assurance¹. The report also outlined ongoing activities of the Internal Audit team, including providing advice and assurance, facilitating the National Fraud Initiative², and promoting fraud awareness. The report noted that it was proposed to remove the audit Mitigation delivery for areas including Biodiversity Net Gain, SANG from the audit plan and include it within the scope of the planned S106 audit instead. It was also anticipated that more time would be needed to support the audit of Temporary Accommodation.

The committee resolved to note the Internal Audit progress report.

Quality Assurance Improvement Programme

The committee was asked to approve the Quality Assurance Improvement Programme (QAIP) outlined in the and . Jan Balfour, Internal Audit Manager, explained that the QAIP is undertaken by the council's Internal Audit function to ensure conformance with the standards for proper practices for the internal audit profession.

The QAIP is designed to evaluate the Internal Audit activity's conformance with the Global Internal Audit Standards³ and application of the Code of Ethics, as well as assess the efficiency and effectiveness of the internal audit activity and identify opportunities for improvement. The QAIP includes both internal and external assessments. An external assessment must be conducted at least once every five years, with internal self-assessments carried out in the interim years. The last external assessment was completed in March 2024. A self-assessment was undertaken in March 2025, which concluded that Internal Audit is delivering a standard that partially conforms to the new standards.

The committee resolved to approve the Quality Assurance Improvement Programme, as set out in the annex to the report.