Afternoon:
9°c
- Phoenix Four hit out at Mandelson over ‘witch-hunt and whitewash’
- Chris Blackhurst: Greedy, yes, but can you touch them for it?
- Phoenix Four hit back at whitewash - the statement in full
- 830 page MG Rover report details restructuring changes
- Disgraced MG Rover boss paid his lover £1.7m
- The men who paid £10 and made £40m
- Labour ‘spin’ condemned for rescue talks leak
- MG Rover records 'deep-cleaned'
- A phoney lord but no fraud, says Moulton
MG Rover auditor Deloitte has escaped censure by the inquiry investigators though questions will continue to be raised over the amount of fees the firm charged.
The investigators, Gervase MacGregor — a partner at accountancy firm BDO Stoy Hayward — and Guy Newey, a QC, said Deloitte partners had “properly discharged their duties” and that the lack of transparency in MG Rover's accounts which Deloitte signed off are the fault of the financial reporting rules the firm employed.
The investigators however did highlight the £30.65 million Deloitte charged MG Rover over the five years and especially the fees for non-audit work which at £28.75 million dwarfed by a factor of 15 times the fees Deloitte received for actually auditing the business.
The investigators said such large add-on fees could have threatened the independence and objectivity of Deloitte's auditing of the company but ruled that no such compromise took place.
Deloitte remains under investigation by the Financial Reporting Council over its work on MG Rover.
