National Grid 2016 Annual Report Download - page 94

Responsibilities for the financial
statements and the audit
Our responsibilities and those of the directors
As explained more fully in the Directors’ Responsibilities Statement,
the directors are responsible for the preparation of the financial
statements and for being satisfied that they give a true and fair view.
Our responsibility is to audit and express an opinion on the financial
statements in accordance with applicable law and ISAs (UK &
Ireland). Those standards require us to comply with the Auditing
Practices Board’s Ethical Standards for Auditors.
This report, including the opinions, has been prepared for and only for
the Company’s members as a body in accordance with Chapter 3 of
Part 16 of the Companies Act 2006 and for no other purpose. We do
not, in giving these opinions, accept or assume responsibility for any
other purpose or to any other person to whom this report is shown
or into whose hands it may come save where expressly agreed by
our prior consent in writing.
What an audit of financial statements involves
An audit involves obtaining evidence about the amounts and
disclosures in the financial statements sufficient to give reasonable
assurance thatthe financial statements are free from material
misstatement, whether caused by fraud or error. This includes an
assessment of:
• whether the accounting policies are appropriate to the Group’s
and the Company’s circumstances and have been consistently
applied andadequately disclosed;
• the reasonableness of significant accounting estimates made
bythe Directors; and
• the overall presentation of the financial statements.
We primarily focus our work in these areas by assessing the directors’
judgements against available evidence, forming our own judgements,
and evaluating the disclosures in the financial statements.
We test and examine information, using sampling and other auditing
techniques, tothe extent we consider necessary to provide a
reasonable basis for us to draw conclusions. We obtain audit
evidence through testing the effectiveness of controls, substantive
procedures or a combination of both.
In addition, we read all the financial and non-financial information
inthe Annual Report to identify material inconsistencies with the
auditedfinancial statements and to identify any information that is
apparently materially incorrect based on, or materially inconsistent
with, the knowledge acquired by us in the course of performing the
audit. If we become aware of any apparent material misstatements
orinconsistencies we consider the implications for our report.
Michael Timar (Senior Statutory Auditor)
for and on behalf of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP
Chartered Accountants and Statutory Auditors
London 18 May 2016
92 National Grid Annual Report and Accounts 2015/16 Financial Statements
Independent auditors’ report
to the Members of National Grid plc continued