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<p>The department requires a high level of transparency of academy trusts. All academy
trusts must have an annual independent audit of their annual accounts by a registered
statutory auditor and academy trusts must be open and transparent and publish their
accounts. This is not a requirement of local authority maintained schools.</p><p>
</p><p>Academy trusts must prepare annual accounts. This provides considerably more
information than other schools and provides a far higher level of public scrutiny
than is required of local authority schools. Their financial performance is instead
summarised within the authorities’ accounts. In addition, academy trusts are audited
externally to international auditing standards, again this is not required of local
authority schools.</p><p> </p><p>The department also publishes the ‘Consolidated Annual
Report and Accounts’, based on returns from all academies in England. The reports
are available for public scrutiny at GOV.UK. The most recent report covering 2015/16
is available at:</p><p><a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academies-consolidated-annual-report-and-accounts-2015-to-2016"
target="_blank">https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academies-consolidated-annual-report-and-accounts-2015-to-2016</a>.
We aim to publish the report for 2016/17 in October.</p>
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