CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee Paper 3 08/03/2019

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY AUDIT & RISK COMMITTEE

FOR DECISION

Title: ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ AUDIT PLAN

Pre­pared by: JOANNE BROWN, JOHN BOYD: GRANT THORNTON

Pur­pose

This paper presents the extern­al auditor’s Annu­al Audit Plan for the audit of the ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ accounts. The plan sets out the key chal­lenges and risks faced by the Author­ity asso­ci­ated with this year-end audit review and the asso­ci­ated audit work that Grant Thornton pro­poses to undertake.

Recom­mend­a­tions

The Audit & Risk Com­mit­tee is asked to:

a) Con­sider the extern­al auditor’s Annu­al Audit Plan for the audit of the Authority’s ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ accounts and wider reviews of oper­a­tions. b) Agree, sub­ject to any com­ments, Audit Scotland’s Annu­al Audit Plan for ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉. c) Agree the extern­al audit fee on behalf of the Board, as set out in the Plan, page 11, Fees and independence.

Exec­ut­ive Summary

1. Extern­al aud­it­ors in the pub­lic sec­tor give an inde­pend­ent opin­ion on the fin­an­cial state­ments. They are also required to provide a view on per­form­ance, reg­u­lar­ity and the organisation’s gov­ernance arrange­ments. In doing this, the aim of the extern­al aud­it­or is to sup­port improve­ment and account­ab­il­ity with­in the audited body.

2. Grant Thornton were appoin­ted by the Aud­it­or Gen­er­al as the Authority’s extern­al aud­it­or for five years in 2017. Their Annu­al Audit Plan for their audit work relat­ing to the Authority’s ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ oper­a­tion­al and fin­an­cial year, and the audit of the asso­ci­ated accounts, is set out in full at Annex I to this paper.

3. The Audit Com­mit­tee is invited to review the cov­er­age of the audit plan and to agree the plan for the ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ audit, includ­ing the pro­posed audit fee.

Danie Ral­ph, Fin­ance Manager Dav­id Camer­on, Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Services 6 Feb­ru­ary 2019

danielralph@​cairngorms.​co.​uk davidcameron@​cairngorms.​co.​uk