Issue - meetings

To receive an update from BDO, external auditors, on the audit arrangements for the Council.

Leigh Lloyd Thomas, BDO auditor, provided an update on the work of the external auditor. He advised that they had undertaken some limited transactional work on the 2018/19 accounts and would be able to do the same for the 2019/20 accounts but was unable to progress any other aspects, such as auditing of the balance sheets in order to give an opinion on the accounts, for either year. This situation would persist until their predecessor, KMPG, had signed off the 2017/18 accounts and given them professional clearance to start the audit for subsequent years.

He reported that this was a unique situation: a previous auditor not having issued a VFM opinion on one set of accounts and another auditor having since been appointed. He had discussed the situation with the Public Sector Audit Appointments (PSAA), the national appointing body for external auditors, who were aware that BDO could not progress with the audit.

The Committee expressed their concern that we have not been able to move forward with the audits of the Council’s accounts for almost four years.

Mr Lloyd-Thomas reassured the Committee that the Council had not failed in its legal duties due to this delay because it had met the requirement to publish the 2018/19 set of accounts and the 2019/20 accounts would also need to be published by 30 November 2020, although stated as unaudited. The delay only caused difficulties in having to undertake a historic audit and the value of a signed set of accounts so far out of date did not give the same level of assurance.

The Committee noted the update from BDO.