Our audit process, and how to contact our external auditor
External Audit
Each year the Council is required to be externally audited to provide assurance that the council’s financial statements are accurate, comply with legal requirements, and reflect a true and fair view of its financial position. The key objectives include:
- Financial Accuracy and Compliance
- Value for Money (VfM) Assessment
- Fraud Detection and Prevention
- Governance and Accountability
- Public Confidence and Transparency
- Regulatory Compliance
The external audit is typically conducted by an independent audit firm. Our auditors, EY, are appointed by the Public Sector Audit Appointments (PSAA), the appointing person for principal local government and police bodies for audits from 2018/19, under the provisions of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014 and the Local Audit (Appointing Person) Regulations 2015. Acting in accordance with this role PSAA is responsible for appointing an auditor and setting scales of fees for relevant principal authorities that have chosen to opt into its national scheme. Our External Auditor’s findings are reported to the council and made publicly available to ensure accountability and transparency. Our latest audited financial statements can be viewed on our Annual accounts page.
To get in touch with EY, please use the following contact details:
One Cambridge Square
Cambridge North
Cambridge
CB4 0AE
Telephone: 01223 394400
Internal Audit
We operate an Internal Audit Service through directly employing four members of staff, and contracted in services of the Head of Internal Audit for Eastern Internal Audit Services.
The Internal Audit Team’s main duty is to conduct internal audits, in compliance with the Global Internal Audit Standards (GIAS), of all areas of the Council, its services, functions, and wholly owned companies to provide management team and elected members with assurance over the governance, risk management and internal control processes in place to ensure processes, procedures and systems are being appropriately delivered, maintained and compliant with legislation and regulations. Each year the Head of Internal Audit is required to provide an Annual Opinion on the robustness of the governance, risk management and control processes within the Council.
Internal Audit are furthermore responsible for the administration and investigation of a range of proactive and reactive counter fraud and corruption work and furthermore ensuring compliance with legislative and policy requirements, and will undertake appropriate action, including formal legal proceedings when appropriate in respect of Council Tax Support Fraud, Council Tax/National Non-Domestic Rates Fraud, Housing/Tenancy Fraud, Money Laundering offences as well as undertaking debtor/absconder tracing investigations to maximise income collection by the council. Please visit our Fraud page and Anti-money laundering page for more information.
Internal Audit also assist other departments of the Council with any ongoing projects, to ensure appropriate controls are implemented and best practices are communicated across services.
The council also has a separate Audit Committee that meets at least four times a year to provide independent assurance and high-level focus on the adequacy of governance, risk, and control arrangements. Its role in ensuring there is sufficient assurance over governance, risk, and control, gives greater confidence to all those charged with governance that those arrangements are effective across the Council and its wholly owned companies. The committee has oversight of both internal and external audit, together with the financial and governance reports, helping to ensure there are adequate arrangements in place for both internal challenge and public accountability. The committee does this by reviewing details and reports relating to governance, risk and control arrangements, internal and external audit, the Council’s wholly owned companies and significant partnerships/collaborations, as well as arrangements for audit and assurances, financial reporting and counter fraud and corruption.