This Guidance Statement (GS) has been formulated by the Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (AUASB) to provide guidance to auditors regarding requests for access to audit working papers relating to the following assurance engagements (herein referred to as an audit or review in this GS):

a. an audit or review of a financial report in accordance with the Corporations Act 2001 (the Act);

b. an audit or review of a financial report, or complete set of financial statements, for any other purpose;

c. an audit or review of other historical financial information;

d. an audit or review of information in a sustainability report in accordance with the Act, or for any other purpose; and

e. other audit or assurance engagements.

This GS also applies, as appropriate, to requests regarding access to an auditor’s internal audit working papers under an entity’s internal audit outsourcing arrangement. The AUASB is considering the approach to sharing documents where there are separate auditors (i.e. audit firms, authorised audit companies or individual auditors) for the financial report and sustainability report, and the value chain for sustainability purposes.