The Local Authority Accounts (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2011

Made: 3rd February 2011

Laid before the Scottish Parliament: 7th February 2011

Coming into force: 31st March 2011

In accordance with section 105(2) of that Act they have consulted with such associations of local authorities as appear to them to be concerned.

Citation and commencement

1

These Regulations may be cited as the Local Authority Accounts (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2011 and come into force on 31st March 2011.

Saving provision

2

• (1) Nothing in these Regulations applies to any accounts that relate to a financial year that began prior to 1stApril 2010.

• (2) Where a local authority has, at any time prior to these Regulations being laid before the Scottish Parliament, contractually bound itself not to disclose publicly the terms on which it remunerates a person, nothing in these Regulations requires the entry in respect of that person in any Remuneration Report to disclose remuneration details relating to a financial year that began on or earlier than 1stApril 2010.

Amendment of the Local Authority Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 1985

3

• (1) The Local Authority Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 1985[^f00002] are amended as follows.

• (2) The existing text of regulation 4 (accounts to be made up and balanced) becomes paragraph(1), and after paragraph (1) insert—

(2) The accounts referred to in paragraph (1) are to contain a Remuneration Report for the financial year to which those accounts relate. (3) That Report is to contain the information set out in the Schedule.

• (3) At the end insert the Schedule set out in the Schedule to these Regulations.

SCHEDULE

Signed

JOHN SWINNEY — A member of the Scottish Executive — 3rd February 2011

Explanatory note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

EXPLANATORY NOTE

These Regulations amend the Local Authority Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 1985 to require a local authority to prepare as part of its annual accounts a Remuneration Report.

Regulation 2 provides that this duty arises in respect of the 2010/11 accounts onwards, with saving provision for cases where there are contractual issues about disclosure in respect of the year in which the Regulations come into force.

Regulation 3 sets out the detail that is to be included in such a Report, by reference to a Schedule inserted into the 1985 Regulations.

Paragraphs 2 to 4 of that Schedule require such a Report to provide relevant general information. Paragraph 5 provides that details must be provided in respect of subsidiary bodies, in addition to the local authority itself.

Paragraphs 6, 7, 9 and 10 of that Schedule make further provision as to the structure of the Remuneration Report.

Paragraph 8 of that Schedule describes the categories in respect of which information must be shown in a Remuneration Report, and paragraphs 11 and 12 describe what is to be included in respect of pension values and contributions.

The accounts of each local authority require to be audited by virtue of section 96(4) of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973. These Regulations do not make any other change to the need for an audit of those accounts, or alter the timescales within which such accounts require to be submitted for audit.

Footnotes

[^f00001]: 1973 c.65; section 105(1) was amended by section 10(2) of the Rating and Valuation (Amendment) (Scotland) Act 1984 (c.31). The functions of the Secretary of State were transferred to the Scottish Ministers by virtue of section53 of the Scotland Act 1998 (c.46).

[^f00002]: S.I. 1985/267, as amended by S.I. 1997/1980.

[^f00003]: S.S.I. 2007/183.

[^f00004]: 1989 c.42.

[^f00005]: 2008 c.30.