Kiama ‘s new councillors are celebrating a clean bill of health for council’s latest financial statements. Photo: Kiama Council.
Kiama Council has taken a major step forward in having its performance improvement order lifted, with the NSW Audit Office giving council’s 2023-24 financial statements a clean bill of health.
CEO Jane Stroud said it was a “brilliant achievement”.
“Having the qualification lifted on council’s financial records is incredibly important and a reward for the tireless efforts of staff,” she said.
“We have a clean audit, delivered on time, and ahead of many other councils.
“Achieving financial sustainability and transparency is essential for Kiama Council if we want to have the NSW Government’s performance improvement order removed.
“This result is a big step forward towards that goal.”
In November 2022, the NSW Government issued council with the performance improvement order (PIO), due to what it saw as council’s failure to meet legislative responsibilities in relation to its financial management. It outlined a number of actions which council was required to fulfil to improve its performance.
In January this year, the government acknowledged that council had taken “significant steps” to address the matters raised in the PIO. It has been altered to recognise the improvement but remains in force.
Chief Financial Officer Olena Tulubinska said council and the finance team worked closely with auditors over the past two years to complete four sets of financial statements and to clear all the issues that were the basis for the qualified audit opinions over those years.
“The result of that work is that the qualification will be lifted and an unmodified audit opinion will be issued for the financial statements 2023-24,” she said.
“I’m so proud of our finance team. I’d also like to thank our engineering and maintenance teams who assisted with stocktakes and inspections,” Ms Tulubinska said.
“In fact, all council staff can take credit for this result. We really pulled together to get our accounts back on track.”
The statements show council recorded a $14.2 million loss in the 2023-24 financial year compared to a $7.6 million loss in 2022-23.
The increased deficit reflected the impact of significant costs outside council’s control, including:
- 15 per cent pay increase for aged care workers ($1.8 million)
- 3.5 per cent pay increase for staff under the Local Government Award ($2.8 million)
- Increase in legal expenses ($1.4 million)
- Additional disaster recovery expenses ($1.5 million).
Mayor Cameron McDonald said despite those one-off factors, council remained on track to improve its financial outlook.
“It’s yet another strong signal to the NSW Government and our own community, that Kiama Council is doing what needs to be done,” he said.
“We’ve taken a massive step forward with the unqualified audit, and we’re making good progress towards a balanced budget by 2026-27, which is another critical part of the performance improvement order.”
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