Council accounts sign-off still awaited

The last three years' accounts of Warrington Council have still not been signed off by the external auditor, Grant Thornton.

Another update was given to the Council's Audit Committee on Thursday evening. Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Finance, Cllr Ian Marks says:

Neither the Council nor the Auditor are willing to commit to a date for the signing off. Given the number of promised dates that have been missed, I can't say I am surprised. All we hear is that progress is being made and the number of issues in dispute is coming down.

Both parties are engaging experts to give them advice so it's not surprising that progress is slow. Experts don't come cheaply either. Changes to the rules and enhanced requirements over the last few years have meant that some back-tracking has had to take place over parts of the accounts that had been ticked off previously.

Hopefully once the 2017/18 accounts have been cleared, it won't take too long for the 2018/19 and 2019/20 sets to be completed. This delay can only be bad for the reputation of the Labour Council, particularly if the finalised accounts are not available before the May elections, that the Government has decided will go ahead.