Stakeholders in the local audit system must continue efforts to secure timely publication of audited accounts, a report by auditor Grant Thornton has urged.

The report said steps that must be taken included improving systems leadership, holding authorities and auditors to account for their performance, a continued focus on the quality of accounts preparation and audit, and working on engagement between auditors and audited bodies.

It said the extent of delays in the publication of audited accounts across the local authority sector was severe and of widespread concern.

Only 12% of audited accounts for 2021-22 were published by the target date of 30 November 2022 and in December 2022 there were more than 600 local audit opinions outstanding.

Grant Thornton made a wide range of recommendations, including that temporary flexibility could be introduced into the local audit framework to allow reduced scope audits to be undertaken on backlogged accounts.

It said this would free up local government for more forward-looking activities, with limited detrimental impact on the users of financial statements.

The report called for new investment and said auditors should be engaged at an early stage where innovative, complex or significant transactions are expected.

It read: ‘The reasons for the delays are multi-faceted.

'There is no single cause of delay and there are, unfortunately, no quick solutions.

'It will take time to return to consistently high performance against target publication dates.'

Last week the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee launched an inquiry into financial reporting and audit in local authorities.