More needs to be done to make auditing an attractive and prestigious profession, and councils stand to benefit hugely if that is achieved, MPs have heard.
Low capacity in council finance teams and the failure to deal with historic accounting issues mean the current September audit deadline is unlikely to be met, local auditors Grant Thornton have...
A further delay to adopting local authority reporting regulations relating to investments is welcome, but the rules need to come into force at some point to avoid undermining transparency, CIPFA has...
Accountants have warned that progress on local audit reforms will stall without further improvements to the audit market and capacity in council finance teams.
A proposed temporary override to financial reporting on councils’ infrastructure has been welcomed by the sector as an opportunity to take a step back and sort out one of the major problems facing...
Local audit firms have been told by the Financial Reporting Council to “urgently” improve the quality and timeliness of their work, after the number of unacceptable audits rose last year.
Failures in the local audit market are leading to “increasingly incomplete and unreliable” data in central government reporting with councils left in the dark over spending decisions, the Public...
Panellists at Public Finance Live agreed something needs to change to speed up audit opinions being issued on council accounts, but were unsure whether giving auditors a statutory deadline is the...
Organisations need to take decisive action to improve the scope and role of internal audit, to avoid weakening risk-management and oversight, says Diana Melville.
The government is set to make it a statutory requirement for councils in England to have independent members on audit committees as part of local audit reforms.
A lack of funding for staff development and challenges around the recruitment of new officers is preventing the internal audit function from reaching its full potential, according to a CIPFA report.
External auditors for South Cambridgeshire District Council have closed the authority’s 2018-19 accounts, after finding significant issues with property valuations.
A senior external auditor is set to become the first director of local audit at the Financial Reporting Council, as part of sector-wide reforms to improve standards.
Almost all eligible public bodies in England have registered for the national auditor procurement scheme run by Public Sector Audit Appointments from 2023, the oversight body has announced.
Local authority organisations have warned that changes that would change the way councils account for debt servicing on commercial property borrowing could have a “devastating” impact on...
