Rank's Audit Committee is comprised solely of independent non-executive directors. Details of the committee's membership throughout 2007 are as follows:
| Date first appointed | |
| John Warren | January 2006 |
| Brendan O'Neill* | October 2004 |
| Bill Shannon | April 2006 |
* Resigned 31 December 2007
John Warren has chaired this committee since April 2006.
The Board is satisfied that all members of the committee have recent and relevant financial experience. Normally the chairman, chief executive, finance director and the company secretary (as head of internal audit) attend committee meetings, as do representatives of the external auditors.
The Audit Committee's responsibilities are set out on page 29, its terms of reference are available on request to the company secretary.
The committee meets at least annually with the external auditors without management being present. The committee keeps under review the independence and objectivity of the external auditors, and their effectiveness. In particular, the committee oversees the nature and amount of non-audit work undertaken by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP each year to ensure that external auditor independence is safeguarded. All non-audit services above a value of £50,000 to be performed by the external auditors are required to be approved by the Audit Committee in advance and the Group's policy is that, where appropriate, non-audit work is put out to competitive tender. Details of the year's fees paid to the external auditors are given in note 3 to the financial statements.
During the year, the Gambling Commission undertook a compliance review of the Grosvenor and Mecca businesses and the results of that review were considered by the committee.
