Welsh Revenue Authority Board minutes: 30 April 2020

Members

• Kathryn Bishop, Chair
• Dyfed Edwards, Deputy Chair
• David Jones, Non-Executive
• Jocelyn Davies, Non-Executive
• Lakshmi Narain, Non-Executive
• Dyfed Alsop, Chief Executive Officer
• Sam Cairns, Chief Operations Officer
• Lucy Robinson, Customer Insight and Strategy
• Rebecca Godfrey, Chief Strategy Officer

Ymgynghorwyr (advisors)

• Joanna Ryder, Chief of Staff
• Melissa Quignon-Finch, Head of HR
• Kate Innes, Interim Chief Finance Officer
• Jim Scopes, Interim Chief Strategy Officer
• Catrin Durie, Head of Communications
• Amy Bowden, Interim Head of Legal
• Anna Adams, Deputy Director of Tax Strategy, Policy and Engagement - Welsh Treasury

Secretariat

• Ceri Sullivan, Board Secretariat

1. The Chair welcomed everybody to the meeting.  Apologies were received from Andrew Jeffreys, and Anna Adams would deputise.
    
2. Board Members were pleased to welcome back Rebecca Godfrey, who was attending on a ‘keeping in touch day’ from maternity leave. Rebecca is due back full-time next week.

1. The situation for our people remained largely the same as last update on the current circumstances.
    
2. The WRA is now moving to medium-term thinking about the next 6 months; post-lockdown activities and operations. The organisation needs to consider what it wants to learn from this experience and takes into the future. The Chief Executive had signalled this discussion to all staff earlier in the week.
    
3. It was also noted that the WRA should feed into wider Welsh Government thinking about COVID-19 recovery.

Information redacted (Footnote 1).

1. A brief report was delivered by the ARAC Chair, and it was noted that the committee would be reviewing cyber security risks arising from staff working from home.
    
2. Following their review of effectiveness, there will also be a review of the Risk Register in order to make it easier to carry out better scrutiny.
    
3. ARAC also agreed its Annual Report which will feed into WRA’s Annual Report and Accounts.
    
4. The People Committee met earlier in the week, since it was agreed that an additional meeting was required to seek assurance that appropriate actions were taken during these difficult times, with regards to staff illness and caring responsibilities, wellbeing, recruitment and location.
    
5. The Committee reported they were reassured in all matters and that the WRA, and particularly that Tîm Arwain continued to have a good overview of the situation, and line managers are very much in touch with their staff.
    
6. Given the expected delay before QED is accessible again, location was viewed as a fluid matter, as it may be impacted by how the WRA will work post COVID-19; the CEO will report on this later in the year.
    
7. The Board thanked both committees for their report and assurances.

Information redacted (Footnote 1).

[1] There are certain circumstances where it is not appropriate to share all of the information contained within the Board minutes, for example, where it contains personal or commercial data or relates to the formulation of government policy etc. or the effective conduct of public affairs. In such circumstances, the information has been redacted and the text is marked clearly that this has been the case.