Grant Thornton puts the council in its worst audit category and expects no clean opinion before 2029/30. Officers have formally disagreed on the record.
The Royal Borough’s own auditor has told the government that the council’s books cannot be properly audited for the foreseeable future, and that a clean opinion on its accounts is not expected until 2029/30.
Grant Thornton set that out in a report to the council’s Audit and Governance Committee, which met at Maidenhead Town Hall on Monday 7 September. (Agenda and papers, Audit and Governance Committee, 7 September 2026)
The auditor has put the council in the bottom category
Every council with disclaimed accounts has been rated A to D for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Grant Thornton assessed Windsor and Maidenhead as Category D. The four categories are defined as follows:
- A: capable of a standards-compliant audit, relatively straightforward.
- B: capable in theory, but with significant operational difficulties.
- C: not capable by 2027/28 because of practical constraints, with adequate systems in principle.
- D: not capable by 2027/28 because of major systemic problems.
The full definition of D refers to “pervasive weaknesses in systems of financial reporting and internal control such that the auditor judges the conditions do not exist for an ISA-compliant audit to be completed in the foreseeable future”. (Regaining Assurance Strategy, Grant Thornton, July 2026)
The assessment was submitted to the ministry in July 2026 and is being used, among other things, to identify councils where a compliant audit is unlikely to be possible by the end of 2027/28.
The council does not accept it
Officers put their disagreement on the record in the covering report. They argue the council belongs in Category C, not D.
“Officers do not consider that the description associated with a ‘D’ assessment, namely that the Council is ‘not capable of achieving an ISA-compliant approach by 2027/28 due to major systemic problems’, accurately reflects the Authority’s current circumstances,” the report says. It adds that the characteristics of a C assessment, which refer to practical constraints rather than major systemic problems, are “a more balanced representation”.
The report sets out the progress officers say the auditor has not weighed:
- The full draft 2025/26 accounts were published by the end of June.
- The core financial ledger and supporting systems “remain fundamentally robust”.
- The team that prepares the accounts is fully resourced.
It concedes that the systems team needs more capacity, with proposals to follow in the 2027/28 budget. (Regaining Assurance Strategy covering report)
Officers also accept that the auditor “may not currently hold sufficient evidence” to support the milder assessment they are asking for.
Five years of accounts nobody has signed off
The council’s accounts were disclaimed for 2021/22, 2022/23, 2023/24 and 2024/25. A disclaimer means the auditor could not gather enough evidence to form any opinion at all. The 2024/25 disclaimer was issued on 25 February 2026.
Before that, the 2020/21 accounts received a limitation of scope, over business rates and collection fund balances, an issue the auditor says has still not been resolved. Grant Thornton’s own covering letter goes further than the council’s report and lists the year ended 31 March 2021 among the disclaimed years.
On the auditor’s plan, disclaimers continue for 2025/26, 2026/27 and 2027/28. A qualified opinion is expected for 2028/29, likely with an “except for” qualification covering comparative figures for reserves. The unmodified opinion follows in 2029/30.
Reserves are the sticking point. They have had no audit assurance for four years, and the 2024/25 audit found “significant errors, valuation errors, omissions and incomplete disclosures” in them.
This year’s audit has already slipped
The 2025/26 audit is meant to conclude by 30 November 2026, ahead of a 31 January 2027 government backstop. Grant Thornton’s progress report, dated 14 August, lists three problems:
- The council’s new finance system went in while the audit was running. It then became unavailable, so refreshed transaction listings could not be obtained and the planned sample selection was not completed.
- The certified valuer’s report on the council’s property was still outstanding, so detailed valuation work had not started. Property valuation was supposed to be the priority, because of problems found in that area in the 2024/25 audit.
- A member of the public has objected to the 2025/26 accounts. The auditor is assessing whether the objection meets the statutory test under the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014 before deciding what it means for the audit.
Auditors return at the end of September and want every working paper, including the valuer’s report, in hand before they do. (Audit progress report, 14 August 2026)
What it costs
The scale fees set by Public Sector Audit Appointments for 2025/26 are:
- £307,377 for the council audit.
- £115,934 for the Royal County of Berkshire Pension Fund audit.
A further £78,496 of Section 31 grant funding has been provided to resource the build-back work. Any extra audit fees from that work in later years will have to be found in future budgets.
There is one clear piece of good news. The pension fund, which the council administers, is rated Category A and is expected to return to an unqualified opinion for 2025/26, having been qualified in 2024/25.
What it means for you
A disclaimed opinion does not mean money has gone missing. It means nobody independent can confirm the figures the council publishes about its own spending, reserves and property. For residents that matters in a practical way: the council is running on Exceptional Financial Support from central government, with £48.754m of capitalisation support agreed in principle for 2026/27. (Exceptional Financial Support for local authorities for 2026-27, MHCLG) Decisions about council tax, fees and service cuts are being taken against accounts that carry no external assurance, and will be for several more years.
The next milestones are the Audit Findings Report and the auditor’s opinion on the 2025/26 accounts, both due at the committee’s November meeting, along with the Value for Money report. We will report what they say.
If you want to check what you are paying now, our Windsor council tax bands page lists every band and parish precept for 2026/27.
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