Changes at the top of West Midlands fire service as auditor issues critical report
West Midlands Fire Authority has a new chairman and new chief fire officer as it seeks to put a series of scandals behind it.
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Councillor Cathy Bayton, who represents St James' ward on Dudley Council, was elected chairman at yesterday's meeting of the authority, following the sudden resignation of Councillor Greg Brackenridge.
The meeting also formally approved the appointment of Simon Tuhill as chief officer. But members were also presented with an independent auditors' report which found that serious shortcomings had been found in the way it recruited senior officers and in the checks it made to their backgrounds.
Avtar Sohal, of external auditors Grant Thornton, identified three significant weaknesses relating to the governance of the authority.
He said the authority had breached its constitution in the suspension of an un-named senior officer in May this year. It has also failed to follow the correct procedures in the appointment of a senior officer earning in excess of £100,000 a year, and had not complied with its responsibilities in checking out the educational qualifications of former chief executive Wayne Brown.
Mr Sohal said it was 'highly unusual' to have to identify significant weaknesses when auditing a public body, and by law he was obliged to make statutory recommendations.
"I can only stress how unusual it is for an auditor to have to make statutory recommendations on the number of significant weaknesses we have in this report," he said.
