SOME of the annual reports published by States-owned or controlled entities are falling short of the “minimum standards” expected by the Comptroller and Auditor General, it has emerged.
Lynn Pamment raised the concern following her latest annual reporting audit, assessing the extent to which annual reports meet the minimum content and best practice criteria she has identified and published.
The audit focussed on the 2025 annual reports of entities controlled or established by the States that were available on or before 31 July this year.
Writing in her subsequent Transparency and Excellence in Annual Reporting document, Ms Pamment said that good annual reporting “enables stakeholders to hold the entity to account effectively”.
She concluded that the majority of annual reports for larger and medium sized entities reviewed met the minimum standards identified for each of the four overarching
principles – being accessible, understandable, transparent and supporting accountability.
But she noted that, while some smaller entities “have made significant improvements to their annual reports since 2020”, she had continued to observe that “other small and very small entities fail to meet the minimum standards I expect from annual reports”.
Other concerns included “limited consistency as to the deadlines by which annual reports are required to be published” and that “some smaller States established entities have disproportionate accounts and audit requirements placed on them compared to some larger entities”.
Ms Pamment recommended that a working group should be established, to improve “the consistency, accountability and transparency” of reporting by smaller entities required to publish standalone annual reports whose financial transactions are also included in the States of Jersey Annual Report.
