Swansea Council didn't comply with its own contract rules when it paid nearly £950,000 to vehicle repair and rental companies last year, a report said. There was no suggestion of any wrongdoing by the fleet maintenance department, but the contract compliance issue had been flagged up on four previous occasions dating back to 2008-09, according to the council's governance and audit committee.
A meeting of the committee became somewhat terse when council leader Rob Stewart rebuked one its members, Phil Sharman, for his line of questioning, claiming he overstepped the mark. Mr Sharman said the committee's role was about "providing suitable challenge and scrutiny".
The meeting heard that in-house audit staff checked all companies which were paid more than £10,000 by the council's fleet maintenance department in 2022-23. There were 17 of them, and they received £947,128 for the work they did. The audit staff found that no contract was in place and that relevant waivers hadn't been completed. Since then several waivers have been completed, resulting in the amount deemed non-compliant falling to £350,000. You can get more Swansea news and other story updates straight to your inbox by subscribing to our newsletters here.
