Britain’s equivalent of the FBI has admitted all is not well with its internal audit and that staff have ‘failed to comply’ with procedures.

Details of what has gone wrong at the Serious Organised Crime Agency are sketchy and not sufficiently ‘material’ to affect the unqualified clean audit opinion of former comptroller and auditor general Sir John Bourn.

But director general and accounting officer William Hughes has admitted in a statement that, while ‘adequate’ risk management and governance arrangements were in place at a strategic level, ‘the operational control framework was not adequate in all areas’.

The admission in the 2006-07 accounts was accompanied by a confession in the annual report and accounts of the National Criminal Intelligence Service that an independent review by an ex-Treasury official had discovered an absence of ministerial approval for one tender.

This has since been subject to ‘a thorough review internally and robust external review’ by, among others, the NAO. No details of this ‘significant issue’ were given and the NAO concluded that the NCIS accounts for 2006-07 gave ‘a true and fair view’.

But Hughes said there were ‘areas of the business where the systems of internal control were not deemed sufficiently developed to be regarded as operating effectively’.

He said assurances have been received from the head of internal audit, but added: ‘The weaknesses stemmed primarily from an absence of formal policies and procedures but also, in some cases, from a failure to comply with existing procedures.’

The head of internal audit concluded that SOCA did not have wholly adequate and effective risk management, control and governance processes in place during the 12-month period to secure the achievement of the organisation’s objectives.

An action plan to address ‘the significant control issue’ has been drawn up to secure ‘continuous improvement of the system’.