There are over 735 town and community councils in Wales. In some cases, these councils jointly provide services through joint committees established for specific services, usually burial services. The Accounts and Audit (Wales) Regulations 2014 require Town and Community Councils to have adequate and effective arrangements in place for an internal audit of their accounting records and their systems of internal control.

The Auditor General for Wales reports annually and his findings are based on a sample of the Town and Community Councils.

The Committee considered the 2017-18 Report together with the Report on Internal Audit Arrangements at Town and Community Councils in Wales, also published in January 2019. The Committee Chair wrote to the Welsh Government on a number of issues raised from the consideration of the Reports and the responses were discussed at Committee on 3 June 2019. The Committee held a scrutiny session on local government issues with the Welsh Government in November 2019.

The Committee considered the findings of the 2015-16 Report (published in January 2017), and responded to the Welsh Government’s White Paper on Local Government Reform: ‘Resilient and Renewed' in April 2017.