Committee Chair comments on Grant Thornton audit response

• Letter to Chair from David Dunckley, CEO of Grant Thornton, 7 February 2019
• Inquiry: Future of audit
• Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee

The BEIS Committee has also published Committee correspondence to the Financial Reporting Council (FRC), to follow up on issues raised during FRC Chief Executive Stephen Haddrill's Committee appearance.

• Letter to Stephen Haddrill, Chief Executive of Financial Reporting Council from Chair, 15 February 2019

Grant Thornton's letter covers issues raised during the evidence session on 30th January including the auditor's responsibilities relating to the detection of fraud, and enforcement sanctions and the levying of fines where auditors fail.

Chair's comments

Rachel Reeves MP, Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee said:

"Auditors are often quick to explain away shortcomings in audits as the inevitable consequence of an ‘expectation gap' where auditors are apparently unable to provide what investors or other stakeholders might expect to see in an audit. But the very least we should demand is that auditors have robust measures in place to pick up blatant cooking of the books. Grant Thornton's latest correspondence adds to the impression given by their public evidence that they are too accepting from the outset that their audits won't be capable of picking up fraud."

Further information

• About Parliament: Select committees
• Visiting Parliament: Watch committees

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