STOCK worth £33,000, which cannot be accounted for at Craven District Council, may be written off.

The discrepancy, which involves the in-house direct labour department, dates back to 1997/98 when auditors noticed that there were no stock certificates to substantiate the accounts.

The store houses materials used in the operation of the direct service department, relating to the dog warden service, housing repairs and refuse collection.

Whilst drawing up the accounts for 1998 to 1999, officers discovered a £33,133 imbalance between the valuation of physical stock and what the accounting records disclosed. The district auditor ordered an investigation.

Vince Green, Craven's head of finance, said stock figures for 1997 to 1998 had to be created as incomplete records were kept and inevitably some things were included as stock that should not have been.

"There is inadequate documentation and uncertainty regarding the precise use of stores, combined with a change early in 1998 from the old to the new accounting system," he added.

Officers have stressed there is no evidence of stock being misappropriated, nor of theft or malpractice, and action has been taken to rectify the situation.

Mr Green added that the stores procedure had been reviewed and further discussion would be taking place with the district auditor about the discrepancies.

The issue was raised at a meeting of the resources sub-committee on Wednesday.

Coun Philip Barrett said: "We cannot go on about it, we have to go on. The money is untraceable."

Coun Dennis Hall added: "I think it is time to draw the line under the past if we have assurances that sufficient systems are now in place to ensure it will not happen again."

He added that someone needed to be accountable for the operation of logging in and out of stock.

Members agreed with Mr Green's recommendation to write the imbalance off.

He said the issue had to be discussed with the external auditors to prove that the council had done all that was possible to rectify the situation.

Audit firm Deloitte & Touche made a series of recommendations, including introducing checks to ensure that the work of all tradesmen was inspected.

Also at the meeting members wrote off a debt of £52,285.60.

The debts resulted from work completed for the water agencies when the authority was acting as an agent before they were privatised.

The agreements specified spending limits which could not be exceeded without the prior approval of the water companies.

"It is now clear that the council exceeded the cash limits, without prior approval, by a total of £52,285.60 which the water companies, despite protracted correspondence and negotiations, will not reimburse," said Mr Green.

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