An internal audit by Orkney Islands Council which looked at the purchase of one of its three new tug boats has found everything to have been done by the book.
A report produced following an audit looking at the actions taken prior to, during, and after the tendering process which led to the council purchasing the tug Freyja of Scapa has provided “substantial assurance” that everything was done to standard.
Chief internal auditor with the council Andrew Paterson reported to councillors on the monitoring and audit committee earlier today.
He told them the audit came with no recommendations whatsoever.
The Freyja is one of three tug boats the council has purchased from tug boat builders and operators Sanmar of Turkey.
She arrived in October 2020 from Turkey following the arrival of her sister ships, Odin and Thor, earlier that year.
Process followed in purchase of Orkney council’s new tug boat finds audit
The three vessels replaced an ageing fleet that had served the council for more than 30 years.
The audit was carried out at the behest of the council’s former interim chief executive John Mundell.
It was also Mr Mundell who signed off on the purchase of the tug boat.
There was little detail as to why Mr Mundell had called the audit team in on the purchase.
This wasn’t lost on councillor Melissa Thomson, a new addition to the committee.
She said she found the former chief exec’s calling for the audit, when he had been among those to sign off on the tug’s purchase was “a bit weird.”
Of course, Mr Mundell wasn’t at this morning’s meeting having departed the council at the end of January.
The council’s head of legal, Gavin Mitchell speculated that Mr Mundell may been simply seeking “comfort that everything was done properly, within proper practice.”
Also during the meeting, Councillor John Ross Scott said he was “quite surprised” at the lack of recommendations.
He added: “they generally come with something.”
He said: “I have some concerns. In the document it says we had substantial assurance, sound procedures followed, and effective engagement between all concerned. This is great. It’s a very good paper.
“Nonetheless, the former chief executive decided to bring this in and ask for an audit.
“We’ve got clear indications here that the legal side and procurement did extremely well.
“But there is some doubt as to the marine services side and whether they understood fully the procedures.”
Councillor left ‘lifting stones to find something not there’?
Mr Scott said he was left wondering why there wasn’t something in the recommendations reflecting this.
Mr Paterson said marine services had followed standard practice and had taken legal advice during the procurement of the Freyja.
Councillor Leslie Manson said Mr Scott may be “trying to lift stones to find something that’s not there.”
He said, having read many such reports over many years, he found it “refreshing” to see a report which simply found that the procedure was carried out satisfactorily and came with no unnecessary comments.
Councillor Gillian Skuse, however, pointed to a section of the report with showed that the council had decided to purchase a “class two” vessel instead of a greener but less powerful “class three” tug boat.
She said: “It doesn’t read particularly comfortable when we’re reducing our carbon footprint.”
The council’s director for enterprise and sustainable regeneration Gareth Waterson pointed out that the new tugs presented “vast improvements” in terms of emissions compared to the 30-year-old vessels they replaced.
He said: “I think you can take comfort that the Freyja is hugely less polluting than the vessel it’s replacing.”
Conversation