PRESSURE intensified on Waverley Borough Council this week after a former senior manager claimed the council’s decision not to publicise a £200,000 fraud in the build up to this year’s election was ‘politically-motivated’.

According to the anonymous whistleblower, a meeting was hastily organised by executive director Paul Wenham and strategic HR manager Wendy Gane after the fraud became apparent in April 2014, in which senior managers were told the fraud investigation “had to be kept quiet and out of the press due to the build up to the 2015 elections”.

The whistleblower added Mr Wenham and Ms Gane were granted their wish, as the details of the fraud only emerged this month, prompting accusations the borough council had tried to cover up the fraud.

However, responding to the latest allegations, a Waverley spokesman strongly denied the meeting between Mr Wenham, Ms Gane and senior managers ever took place, describing any suggestion that the fraud investigation was not disclosed for political reasons as “nonsense”.

The spokesman reiterated that the relevant councillors were informed at the time and the incident had been reported in the external audit, which is a public document - albeit without going into any substantial detail about the offence or figures involved.

“It’s absolute rubbish to say such a meeting ever took place and the idea that the fraud had to be kept quiet in the build up to the election would not have been particularly sensible to say the least,” the spokesman told The Herald.

“The way it was reported to the audit committee followed normal procedure and all members of that committee were fully informed. As this is subject to an ongoing police investigation, the council doesn’t want to say any more at this stage.”

At Tuesday’s full council meeting, John Williamson, leader of Waverley’s new opposition group Farnham Residents, queried why the incident was not mentioned in the external audit for the financial year in which it happened.

Committee members received the minutes of September’s audit committee meeting, which contained Grant Thornton’s external audit findings report for the financial year ending March 31, 2015, but it omitted any reference to an incident in April 2014 when Waverley staff were duped into using a fake bank account for payments to Mears, its repairs contractor.

Responding to Mr Williamson, committee chairman Waverley Mayor Mike Band said the incident had been noted in the external audit for the previous year ending March 31, 2014. He accepted it had occurred in the following financial year but did not explain why it did not appear in the relevant monitoring period.

“I find this worrying,” Mr Williamson said. “The minutes show the audit committee was satisfied, despite the obvious inaccuracies we have learned about through the press and [online blog] Waverley Web.

“The audit committee and the executive committee accepted the audit, despite knowing the fraud event had been covered up.”

Mr Band warned Mr Williamson to “be careful of his language” as there was an ongoing police investigation and described the councillor as “distinctly unhelpful” when he continued to press the matter.

“On a point of order, I do not think we should enter into any debate on this issue because it is part of an ongoing police investigation,” Farnham councillor Pat Frost told the meeting. “I take great exception to these statements and the comments are not necessarily accurate.”

Audit committee chairman and Haslemere councillor Jim Edwards said: “I understand when you read the headlines it sounds pretty awful but I would point out the external audit report does say exactly what happened and what’s happening. We are trying to get it sorted.

“All councillors were able to access what the situation was. We are doing our very best and we are not trying to hide anything.”

When Farnham Residents member John Fraser spoke out to say he was “shocked” as a new councillor to learn about the allegations in the press, there were angry cries of “no” from Tory members and Mr Band told him repeating allegations was “not helpful”.

Mr Edwards invited opposition councillors to meet him after the meeting so he could “hopefully satisfy their concerns” and he read out the Grant Thornton report for the financial year to the end of March 2014, in which the auditors said they had been made aware of “an external fraud affecting the council in April 2014”.

“An investigation was immediately conducted and processes and arrangements within the finance team have been strengthened,” the report stated.

In a statement to the press last week, Waverley confirmed it was a victim of fraud in April 2014 and said a significant proportion of the funds had been recovered. West Midlands Police is conducting an investigation into the fraud to try and locate the suspect.