Assurance Arrives After the Invoice
Boards approved AI investment on a strategic case. Internal audit, audit committees and external auditors are now arriving with a different set of questions, on a different timetable. The interesting part is not what they will ask. It is who in the organisation is expected to answer.
In this briefing
- Introduction
- Two things happening on separate clocks
- What changes for an audit chair
- The supplier dimension that gets missed
- Three questions that are starting to appear
- The external auditor is looking at something different
- The second line question
- Where the non-executive sits in this
- The investor read on the same facts
- What we would be watching
- References
Introduction
There is a particular silence that falls in an audit committee room. It happens when a paper has been presented well, the chair asks a question that sits slightly outside the paper, and everyone realises the answer is not in the room.
We have watched that silence land on AI investment three times in the last year, in three different organisations, and the question was more or less the same each time. Not whether the tool works. Not whether the business case was approved. Something narrower: how would we know if it stopped working, and who would tell us?
That question is about to become routine.
Two things happening on separate clocks
The first is adoption. The National Audit Office reported in March 2024 that 70% of the government bodies it surveyed were piloting or planning to use AI, spanning operational decision support and internal process work.[1] Central guidance followed. The AI Playbook for the UK Government was published in February 2025, setting out ten principles for public sector use of AI, the tenth of which addresses assurance directly and encourages organisations to stand up an AI review board or bring the question into an existing programme board.[2]
The second is the rebuild of local audit itself. The Local Audit Office was legislated for through the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026,[3] with government intending it to be established in autumn 2026 and to take responsibility for the backstop programme and for oversight of rebuilding assurance at local bodies from April 2027.[4] Staff and functions…
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This briefing reflects the author's analysis and understanding of the market, based on professional experience and information available at the time of publication. It is provided for information and discussion and is not legal, financial, investment or other professional advice. Full disclaimer.