This FEE Position Paper focusses on the role of practitioners in providing assurance on the requirements of the EU Directive on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information. Member States should have transposed this Directive into their national laws by 6 December 2016; companies will need to apply this to their reports from 2017 on.

The Directive requires 6,000 large European companies to disclose information at least on environmental, social, and employee-related matters, as well as on the respect for human rights, anti-corruption, and bribery issues. These companies also have to disclose the diversity policy for their administrative, management and supervisory boards.

Statutory auditors need to “check” whether these disclosures are actually reported. Member States may also require an independent assurance service provider to “verify” this information.

In this paper, FEE sets out what these provisions mean in practice and how the European accountancy profession can add credibility and trust to the data reported, and serve stakeholders’ needs.

Related document:
FEE Position Paper on EU Directive on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information – The role of practitioners in providing assurance

Related files:
  Factsheet on EU Directive on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by certain large undertakings and groups