FRC review of sustainability assurance market

Given the growing need for reliable sustainability reporting, the FRC have launched a market review of sustainability assurance to look at competition and choice, market capacity and the possible impact on the statutory audit market.

It is interesting that 84% of the FTSE100 sought ‘some form’ of sustainability assurance in 2022 - there is more data from the IFAC study available here: The State of Play in Sustainability Assurance | IFAC.

The announcement is here and the consultation is available here, closing on 13th June.

The consultation asks:

Q1. How well is the UK sustainability assurance market currently functioning? To what extent does it help support economic growth or create burdens and costs on business?
Q2. What, if any, interplays exist between the UK sustainability assurance and UK audit markets?
Choice and competition
Q3. To what extent do UK companies have sufficient choice of sustainability assurance provider? What factors, such as quality, influence their choice? How might this change?
Q4. How does competition work in the UK sustainability assurance market? How might this change?
Market capacity, opportunities and barriers to entry / expansion
Q5. What, if any, capacity issues exist in the UK sustainability assurance market? How might these change?
Q6. What are the opportunities for firms in the UK sustainability assurance market? To what extent are there any barriers to entry/expansion?
Regulatory framework and future developments
Q7. How might international regulatory developments affect the UK sustainability assurance market?
Q8. What, if anything, would you like to see change in the UK market? (For example, any regulatory /policy changes and/or any specific actions taken by FRC, Government, firms, companies or others).

Published 21 March, 2024