The Directors acknowledge their responsibility for establishing and maintaining the Group’s and the Company’s systems of internal control. These are designed to safeguard the assets of the Group and to ensure the reliability of financial information for both internal use and external publication.
Procedures and approval
The Group’s internal control procedures include Board approval for all significant projects. All major expenditure requires either Executive Leadership Team or Board approval at the appropriate stages of each transaction. A system of regular reporting covering both technical progress of projects and the state of the Group’s financial affairs provides appropriate information to management to facilitate control. The Board reviews, identifies, evaluates and manages the significant risks that face the Group.
Systems
The Group has in place internal control and risk management systems in relation to the Group’s financial reporting process and the Group’s process for preparing consolidated accounts. These systems include policies and procedures to ensure that adequate accounting records are maintained and transactions are recorded accurately and fairly to permit the preparation of consolidated financial statements in accordance with IFRS.
The Audit Committee reviews draft annual and interim reports before recommending their publication to the Board. The Audit Committee discusses with the Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and external auditors the significant accounting policies, estimates and judgments applied in preparing these reports.
Any systems of internal control can only provide reasonable, and not absolute, assurance that material financial irregularities will be detected or that the risk of failure to achieve business objectives is eliminated.
Share dealing code
The Company has adopted a share dealing code for Directors and relevant employees, which is in accordance with the requirements of the Market Abuse Regulation (Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014) and applicable legislation.