Audit Opinion

We have audited the Statement of Accounts which comprises the consolidated revenue account, consolidated balance sheet, statement of total movements in reserves, cashflow statement, pension fund account, pension fund net assets statement and the notes to those statements which have been prepared in accordance with the accounting policies applicable to local authorities as set out in the Statement of Accounting Policies.

This report is made solely to Leicestershire County Council in accordance with Part II of the Audit Commission Act 1998 and for no other purpose, as set out in paragraph 54 of the Statement of Responsibilities of Auditors and of Audited Bodies, prepared by the Audit Commission.

As described in the Statement of Responsibilities for the Statement of Accounts, the Director of Resources is responsible for the preparation of the Statement of Accounts in accordance with the Code of Practice on Local Authority Accounting in the United Kingdom 2004.  Our responsibilities, as independent auditors, are established by statute, the Code of Audit Practice issued by the Audit Commission and our profession’s ethical guidance.

We report to you our opinion as to whether the Statement of Accounts presents fairly the financial position and results of operations of the Council.

We review whether the Statement on Internal Control reflects compliance with CIPFA’s guidance “The Statement on Internal Control in Local Government: Meeting the requirements of the Accounts and Audit Regulations 2003” published on 2 April 2004.  We report if it does not comply with proper practices specified by CIPFA or if the statement is misleading or inconsistent with other information we are aware of from our audit of the Statement of Accounts.  We are not required to consider, nor have we considered, whether the Statement on Internal Control covers all risks and controls.  We are also not required to form an opinion on the effectiveness of the authority’s corporate governance procedures or its risk and control procedures.  Our review was not performed for any purpose connected with any specific transaction and should not be relied upon for any such purpose.

We read the other information published with the Statement of Accounts and consider the implications for our report if we become aware of any apparent misstatements or material inconsistencies with the Statement of Accounts. The information comprises only the explanatory foreword, statement of responsibilities for the statement of accounts, statement of assurance on corporate governance and on the system of internal control, and statement of accounting policies and estimation techniques.

We conducted our audit in accordance with the Audit Commission Act 1998 and the Code of Audit Practice issued by the Audit Commission, which requires compliance with relevant auditing standards issued by the Auditing Practices Board.

An audit includes examination, on a test basis, of evidence relevant to the amounts and disclosures in the Statement of Accounts.  It also includes an assessment of the significant estimates and judgements made by the Council in the preparation of the Statement of Accounts, and of whether the accounting policies are appropriate to the Council’s circumstances, consistently applied and adequately disclosed.

We planned and performed our audit so as to obtain all the information and explanations which we considered necessary in order to provide us with sufficient evidence to give reasonable assurance that the Statement of Accounts are free from material misstatement, whether caused by fraud or other irregularity or error.  In forming our opinion, we evaluated the overall adequacy of the presentation of the information in the Statement of Accounts.

In our opinion the Statement of Accounts present fairly the financial position of Leicestershire County Council as at 31March 2005 and its income and expenditure for the year then ended.

We certify that we have completed the audit of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Audit Commission Act 1998 and the Code of Audit Practice issued by the Audit Commission.