The Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG), with the support of the NAO, provides an independent audit opinion on over 400 individual accounts across the public sector, including:

  • all government departments
  • executive agencies
  • arm’s-length bodies
  • companies, audited under statute or on a voluntary basis
  • charities

True and fair opinions

The C&AG a true and fair audit opinion on each account. This involves obtaining evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements sufficient to give reasonable assurance that the financial statements are free from material misstatement, whether caused by fraud or error.

Our public sector audit portfolio increasingly includes commercial entities such as Network Rail, the BBC and several Train Operating Companies. The scope and nature of our audit work is defined by international standards in auditing. We have carried on investing in our in-house IT audit capability to make greater use of technology in our audits to:

  • Enhance quality by using automated tools that help our auditors focus their efforts on the key risks to their audits
  • Increase insight through improved understanding of business processes and supporting technology
  • Deliver efficiency by automating the more routine aspects of our work to allow it to be done more quickly and so ensure we focus effort where in-depth work and professional judgement is needed

We use the knowledge and insight gained from our financial audits to inform our other work, such as value for money studies and investigations.

Regularity opinion

Spend is deemed ‘regular’ when money provided by Parliament is spent on purposes intended by Parliament. The use of resources authorised by Parliament is deemed regular where resources have been used in the way Parliament intended and authorised.

The Government Resources and Accounts Act 2000 requires the C&AG to provide an opinion on regularity for all resource and other departmental accounts prepared under this Act. Regularity opinions are also provided by convention on the vast majority of other audits performed by the C&AG, where public money is involved.

Whole of Government Accounts

The Whole of Government Accounts (WGA) offers a unique view of the UK’s public finances, showing the totality of government spending and clearly articulating the extent of government’s assets and liabilities. It consolidates the financial information of over 10,000 public bodies from central and local government and public corporations.

As a consolidated account, the WGA is intended to be published around one year after the completion of most audits of public bodies. The most recent are the financial statements for 2023-24.

The C&AG disclaimed his audit opinion in 2023-24 for the second successive year, due to the number of English Local Authorities that were either missing from the WGA or were in the WGA based on unaudited information.

Modified audit opinions on 2024-25 financial statements

Updated: 22 May 2026

For earlier audits, see Modified opinions from previous years

2024-25 Disclaimed Opinion

  • Child Maintenance Client Funds Accounts (1993 and 2003 schemes) (The C&AG did not express either a ‘true and fair’ or regularity opinion because of the significance of the matters described in the Basis of Disclaimer of Opinion section of his audit certificate)
  • College of Policing (The C&AG did not express either a ‘true and fair’ or regularity opinion because of the significance of the matters described in the Basis of Disclaimer of Opinion section of his audit certificate)

2024-25 True and Fair Qualifications

2024-25 Regularity Qualifications

2024-25 C&AG’s Reports on Unqualified Accounts