UK SRS: sustainability reporting

No. UK SRS S1 and S2 were published by the Department for Business and Trade on 25 February 2026 for voluntary use.

The FCA's final rules (PS26/19, 30 September 2026) require listed companies in five listing categories to report against them on a comply-or-explain basis for accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027.

Comply or explain is not mandatory reporting: a company may explain instead of disclosing.

Every other UK entity may use the standards voluntarily.

Two standards for disclosing sustainability-related financial information: UK SRS S1, the general requirements, and UK SRS S2, climate-related disclosures.

They are the UK-endorsed versions of the ISSB’s IFRS S1 and IFRS S2, issued by the Secretary of State for Business and Trade and published on 25 February 2026.

SRS stands for Sustainability Reporting Standards.

Sustainability Reporting Standards.

In the UK context it means UK SRS S1 and UK SRS S2.

The abbreviation is also used in other jurisdictions for their own versions of the ISSB Standards, which is why this site always writes UK SRS.

UK SRS itself is a pair of standards, not a regulation: UK SRS S1 and S2, published by the Department for Business and Trade on 25 February 2026 for voluntary use.

The binding text for listed companies is the FCA’s rule instrument, the UK Listing Rules (Sustainability Reporting Standards Disclosure) Instrument 2026, made on 24 September 2026 and in force on 1 January 2027, which requires comply-or-explain reporting against UK SRS for listed companies in UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22.

Other UK entities have no UK SRS rule to follow.

The standards are published by the Department for Business and Trade for voluntary use, and the obligation for listed companies comes from the FCA’s listing rules under PS26/19, which are the legal instrument for them.

The Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation, which closes on 30 November 2026, considers how UK SRS should be reflected in the Companies Act; that is a consultation, not law.

Not in the sense usually meant.

From accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, listed companies in UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22 must report against UK SRS or explain what they have not disclosed and why.

CP26/5 had proposed making UK SRS S2 mandatory for them; the final rules did not.

That listed companies in UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22 report against UK SRS S1 and S2 on a comply-or-explain basis, for accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, with first reporting in 2028.

The rules replace the existing TCFD-aligned listing-rule disclosures.

They sit in the UK Listing Rules (Sustainability Reporting Standards Disclosure) Instrument 2026, made on 24 September 2026 and in force on 1 January 2027.

Yes.

The FCA Board made the instrument on 24 September 2026 and published it in PS26/19 on 30 September 2026.

It comes into force on 1 January 2027 and applies to accounting periods beginning on or after that date.

Nobody yet.

The FCA rules are made but not in force until 1 January 2027, and they apply from the first accounting period beginning on or after that date.

Until then UK SRS is used only voluntarily, and outside the five listing categories it stays voluntary.

Some of it is.

SECR requires energy and carbon reporting from quoted companies and large unquoted companies and LLPs; the Companies Act requires climate-related financial disclosures from large companies under section 414CB; ESOS requires energy assessments from large undertakings.

UK SRS reporting is comply or explain for listed companies in five categories from 2027, and voluntary for everyone else.

For listed companies in UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22: UK SRS on a comply-or-explain basis for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, with statements on assurance and, for UKLR 6, 16 and 22, transition plans.

Alongside that, whatever applies already: SECR for quoted companies and large unquoted companies and LLPs, the Companies Act climate-related financial disclosure duty for the largest companies and LLPs, and ESOS for large undertakings.

For UK SRS reporting, UK SRS S1 and S2.

For SECR, the regulations themselves and the government’s environmental reporting guidelines, usually with the GHG Protocol and the government conversion factors.

The Companies Act climate duty sets its own eight disclosures, which UK SRS S2 can satisfy as a national reporting framework.

UK groups reporting in the EU may also meet the ESRS.

For some companies.

SECR requires quoted companies to report global Scope 1 and 2 emissions, and large unquoted companies and LLPs to report UK energy use and associated emissions, in their annual reports under SI 2018/1155.

UK SRS S2 asks for Scope 1, 2 and 3, but only listed companies in five categories are asked to report against it, on a comply-or-explain basis, from 2027.

A company either makes the UK SRS disclosures or states what it has not disclosed, why, and what it is doing about it.

For UK SRS S2 the statement summarises the requirements not met; for UK SRS S1 it names the risks and opportunities identified but not disclosed.

The FCA's draft Technical Note 803.1, out for comment until 28 October 2026, proposes that an explanation can be short and proportionate and need not give a timeframe.

PS26/19 records that full UK SRS disclosure is not yet feasible for some smaller issuers and that a mandatory approach could be disproportionately burdensome for them.

Views differed: many buy-side and professional-service respondents supported mandatory climate disclosure, while listed companies were more mixed.

The FCA also declined a size threshold, saying climate exposure depends on business model and sector, not size.

The standards are not law in themselves: they carry no effective date and bind nobody by their own terms.

The obligation to use them comes from the FCA's listing rules, made under its powers in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, and applies only to listed companies in five categories.

The government has said it will consider how UK SRS should be reflected in the Companies Act 2006, which is a statement of intent, not a proposal.

Through a separate instrument, never through the standards themselves.

UK SRS S1 ¶¶73B and E5 and UK SRS S2 ¶C6 make them subject to the Companies Act, FCA rules or another UK regulator.

The FCA has used that route: its listing rules, made on 24 September 2026, apply UK SRS to listed companies in five categories on a comply-or-explain basis from 1 January 2027.

The Companies Act route has not been used.

The rules themselves are made: the instrument was made on 24 September 2026 and comes into force on 1 January 2027.

What is still open is guidance — draft Technical Note 803.1, with comments due by 28 October 2026 — and the FCA’s supervisory approach, which it plans to update in the second half of 2027.

Neither changes the dates in the rules.

A government decision to apply UK SRS through the Companies Act.

The Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation, open until 30 November 2026, says only that the government will consider how UK SRS should be reflected in the Act; any duty for unlisted companies would need that route.

Until then, UK SRS is comply or explain for five listing categories and voluntary for everyone else.

The standards were published on 25 February 2026 and could be used voluntarily from that day.

The FCA’s rules applying them to listed companies come into force on 1 January 2027 and apply to accounting periods beginning on or after that date, so the first reports under the rules appear in 2028.

UK SRS S1, the general requirements for sustainability-related financial information, and UK SRS S2, climate-related disclosures, both published on 25 February 2026.

They are the UK-endorsed versions of the ISSB's IFRS S1 and IFRS S2.

In the same year the FCA finalised rules applying them to listed companies from 2027, on a comply-or-explain basis.

Two are open.

The FCA is consulting on draft Technical Note 803.1, on how to comply or explain, in Primary Market Bulletin 66, with comments due by 28 October 2026.

The government's Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation, open until 30 November 2026, says the government will consider how UK SRS should be reflected in the Companies Act.

The DBT consultation on the standards themselves closed on 17 September 2025.

They refer to the same endorsement project.

The published standards are titled UK Sustainability Reporting Standards, abbreviated UK SRS.

Older government material and the advisory committee's name use the word disclosure, which is where UK SDS comes from.

Stating a proposal as a rule.

Before 30 September 2026 that meant describing CP26/5 as settled; since then it means repeating what CP26/5 proposed — mandatory UK SRS S2, 515 companies, a statement-only route for secondary listings — after the final rules changed all three.

Under the FCA's rules, companies listed in five categories: UKLR 6 (commercial companies), UKLR 14 (international commercial companies with a secondary listing), UKLR 15 (depositary receipts), UKLR 16 (non-equity and non-voting equity shares) and UKLR 22 (the transition category).

Closed-ended and open-ended funds, shell companies, debt, securitised derivatives and warrants are excluded.

Anyone else may use UK SRS voluntarily.

The FCA's Policy Statement gives no total.

Its consultation, CP26/5, estimated that around 600 listed companies would be affected; that is the consultation's estimate, not a count in the final rules.

PS26/19 does say that the 89 issuers with a secondary listing or depositary receipts are now subject to the same requirements as domestic listed issuers.

UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22 (PS26/19 ¶3.6).

UKLR 11 and 12 funds, UKLR 13 shell companies and UKLR 17, 18 and 19 debt, securitised derivatives and miscellaneous securities are outside (¶3.7).

Not as a requirement.

No government document proposes a UK SRS threshold or date for private or unlisted companies.

The Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation, open until 30 November 2026, says the government will consider how UK SRS should be reflected in the Companies Act 2006; it contains no proposal or date.

Large private companies may already have Companies Act climate-disclosure and SECR duties.

There is no size test at all.

The FCA's rules turn on the listing category, and the FCA declined respondents' calls for a size threshold.

A small listed company in UKLR 6 is in scope; a large unlisted one is not.

Proportionality comes through comply or explain and through the standards themselves, which let a company use an approach commensurate with its circumstances in places such as scenario analysis.

Only if they are listed in one of the five categories, and then on comply-or-explain.

PS26/19 records the FCA's view that a mandatory approach could be disproportionately burdensome for smaller issuers, which is part of why it chose comply or explain.

An unlisted SME has no UK SRS duty and none is proposed.

Not through the FCA's UK SRS rules.

AIM securities are not admitted to the Official List, so the UK Listing Rules categories PS26/19 amends do not cover them.

An AIM company with more than 500 employees is, however, in the Companies Act climate-related financial disclosure regime.

The standards carry no territorial provision of their own because they are not law.

The FCA's rules draw scope by listing category, not by where a company is based or incorporated, so a company listed in one of the five categories is caught wherever it sits in the UK.

A Jersey- or Guernsey-incorporated company with a UK listing in those categories is caught in the same way.

Yes, on comply or explain.

CP26/5 proposed only a signposting statement for UKLR 14 and 15; PS26/19 ¶1.7(2) reversed that.

Where home-jurisdiction reporting aligns with UK SRS outcomes the company may already broadly comply and may rely on it, explaining where UK SRS is not met in full.

The transition-plan statement does not apply to them.

The standards have no effective date: the provisions were removed before publication so that legislation or the FCA could set timing.

The FCA's rules come into force on 1 January 2027 and apply to accounting periods beginning on or after that date, so first reports appear in 2028.

For listed companies in scope, from the first accounting period beginning on or after 1 January 2027.

A calendar-year company reports on 2027 in its 2028 annual report; a company with a period beginning on 1 April 2027 reports on the year to 31 March 2028.

Voluntary users may apply the standards now.

In 2028.

The rules apply to accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, so a company with a calendar year end reports on its 2027 year in its 2028 annual report.

A company whose period began before 1 January 2027 may keep using the TCFD-aligned rules for that period, or adopt UK SRS early and keep the same transitional reliefs.

There is no single deadline.

The rules apply to periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, and the disclosures sit in the annual financial report, which the Disclosure and Transparency Rules require within four months of the year end (DTR 4.1.3R).

For a calendar 2027 year that points to 30 April 2028.

The standards carry three: climate-only reporting under UK SRS S1 ¶E3, Scope 3 relief under UK SRS S2 ¶C4, and a GHG measurement-method relief under ¶C3.

The standards left the first two untimed.

For listed companies the FCA has set them: two years for the climate-first relief and one year for Scope 3, from initial application (PS26/19 ¶3.14), with the method relief for one year if that method was used immediately before (¶3.16).

No. A company relying on a transitional relief states that it is doing so, and PS26/19 ¶3.20 says no further explanation is needed during the relief period.

Under the standards themselves, UK SRS S1 ¶73A requires the use of a relief to be disclosed alongside the statement of compliance.

Nothing becomes mandatory.

For periods beginning in 2028 the Scope 3 relief has expired and Scope 3 is comply or explain like everything else (PS26/19 ¶3.23).

From periods beginning on or after 1 January 2029 both reliefs have expired and every UK SRS disclosure is comply or explain (¶3.24).

The government removed the effective-date provisions so that timing could be set by legislation or FCA rules, and to avoid confusion with the introduction of any reporting requirements (consultation response ¶1.21).

DBT told the FCA on 5 January 2026 that it would remove the specific time references about the reliefs for the same reason.

DBT's letter to the FCA of 5 January 2026 said the government would remove specific time references about when the reliefs apply and specify instead that timing would be set out in government regulations, FCA rules or by another relevant authority.

PS26/19 is that FCA rule for listed companies.

Yes.

A company whose accounting period begins before 1 January 2027 may keep to the TCFD-aligned rules for that period or voluntarily report under the new UK SRS limbs, and PS26/19 ¶3.19 lets an early adopter use the same transitional reliefs.

CP26/5 had proposed denying early adopters the reliefs.

Yes.

The consultation response says that for voluntary reporters UK SRS is available to use immediately, and because the standards carry no effective date an entity may apply them to a period of its choosing.

A voluntary user takes the reliefs as the standards write them, without the FCA's time limits.

UK SRS S1 sets the general requirements for sustainability-related financial information: the materiality test, the four content areas and how the disclosures connect to the financial statements.

UK SRS S2 applies that structure to climate: greenhouse gas emissions, climate scenario analysis, targets and any transition plan.

UK SRS S1 ¶E2 requires the two to be applied at the same time.

Financial materiality.

UK SRS S1 ¶3 asks for information about sustainability-related risks and opportunities that could reasonably be expected to affect the entity's cash flows, its access to finance or its cost of capital over the short, medium or long term. ¶18 defines material by influence on primary users' decisions, and ¶B19 sets no threshold.

Existing and potential investors, lenders and other creditors.

Materiality is judged by influence on their decisions, which is what makes UK SRS a financial-reporting standard rather than an impact-reporting one.

No. UK SRS S1 ¶B25 says an entity need not disclose information that is not material, even where a standard lists it as a specific or minimum requirement.

Materiality judgements are reassessed at each reporting date (¶B28).

UK SRS S1 covers every sustainability-related risk and opportunity that meets its test, so it is not limited to climate.

Climate is the one topic written out in full, in UK SRS S2.

There are no separate UK SRS topical standards for water, biodiversity or workforce in the way the ESRS provide them.

Its front matter says it is set out in paragraphs 1 to 86, but that sentence was carried over from IFRS S1 unamended: UK SRS S1 also contains ¶¶73A and 73B, which are UK additions.

It has five appendices, A to E, each with the same authority as the body.

UK SRS S1 runs to paragraphs 1 to 86 plus 73A and 73B, with Appendices A to E. UK SRS S2 is set out in paragraphs 1 to 37 and Appendices A to C, all of equal authority.

Both are free on GOV.UK.

Strategy, ¶¶28 to 42. ¶29 divides it into five limbs: the risks and opportunities, the business model and value chain, strategy and decision-making, the effects on financial position, performance and cash flows, and resilience.

Yes.

Each appendix to UK SRS S1 says it is an integral part of the standard with the same authority as the other parts, and UK SRS S2 says all its paragraphs have equal authority.

Appendix E of S1 and Appendix C of S2 hold the application and transition provisions.

A UK addition with no IFRS equivalent.

An entity using the climate-only relief at ¶E3 may not assert compliance with UK SRS S1 and must disclose its use of the relief.

It may still assert compliance with UK SRS S2, provided it discloses the reliefs it used.

UK SRS S1 ¶¶73B and E5 and UK SRS S2 ¶C6 make application of the standards subject to anything set by the Companies Act, the FCA or another UK body able to make reporting requirements.

It is the machinery the FCA used when PS26/19 set the relief periods for listed companies.

The standards are issued by the Secretary of State for Business and Trade and were published on GOV.UK by DBT on 25 February 2026.

Their copyright notice adds that they have not been prepared or endorsed by the ISSB.

The FRC hosted the advisory committee but does not issue the standards, and the FCA applies them through its listing rules.

Only if you have applied the standards and your use of reliefs allows it.

UK SRS S1 ¶¶72 to 73 govern the statement of compliance and ¶73A bars a compliance claim for S1 where the climate-only relief is used.

The FCA's draft TN 803.1 adds that an issuer explaining against a requirement cannot make an explicit and unreserved statement of compliance, and that the listing rules require no separate compliance statement.

For most preparers, S2, because it requires Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, scenario analysis and targets.

Under the FCA rules a listed company may also report climate-first for its first two periods, deferring S1 beyond climate.

UK SRS S1 ¶E3 permits climate-only disclosure.

The consequence is at ¶73A: you may not assert compliance with UK SRS S1 and must disclose the relief, though you may still assert compliance with UK SRS S2.

For listed companies the FCA limits this to the first two periods.

Almost.

UK SRS S1 and S2 are the ISSB's IFRS S1 and S2 endorsed for the UK, with UK amendments.

UK SRS S2 is based on IFRS S2 as amended by the ISSB in December 2025.

Annex A of the government's consultation response maps each difference; where a requirement is not in it there is no difference, so compliance with UK SRS is not automatically compliance with the ISSB Standards.

Not automatically.

UK SRS is the UK’s endorsed version of IFRS S1 and S2, and Annex A of the government response maps every difference.

Most UK changes relax or remove something, so a UK SRS report can meet UK SRS without meeting IFRS S1 and S2 in full, for example where it relies on the untimed reliefs or does not consider the SASB Standards.

There is a Framework for developing UK Sustainability Reporting Standards, published by the government, which sets out how the UK assesses and endorses ISSB standards.

It is a process document, not a reporting framework; the reporting requirements are in UK SRS S1 and S2 themselves.

No authoritative count exists.

The government consulted on six proposed amendments in June 2025, but one was withdrawn after the ISSB made the change itself in December 2025, one was replaced by removing the relief time limits, and further provisions (¶¶73A, 73B, B59A and E5) were added.

Annex A maps the final differences and gives no count.

Largely no.

The UK changed "shall" to "may" in UK SRS S1 ¶¶55(a) and 58(a) and UK SRS S2 ¶¶12, 23 and 32, so an entity may refer to and consider them.

UK SRS S2 ¶37 and ¶B65(d) keep "shall".

A UK addition to UK SRS S2 and the one place UK SRS asks for more than IFRS S2.

Where an entity finds it impracticable to estimate financed emissions for the same period as its financial statements, it must say why, describe the measurement approach, inputs and assumptions of any figure it gives, and set out its plan and timeline to catch up.

It is the annex to the government's consultation response mapping every difference between UK SRS and IFRS S1 and S2.

It states that where a requirement is not in its table there is no difference, which makes it the only exhaustive account of what the UK changed.

The Technical Advisory Committee, with the FRC as secretariat, agreed its endorsement recommendations at a public meeting on 5 December 2024 and published them on 18 December 2024.

DBT consulted on exposure drafts from 25 June to 17 September 2025 and published the final standards on 25 February 2026.

209.

The government response records 199 from organisations and 10 from individuals, 170 through an online survey and 39 by email.

68% of those answering the relevant question (125 of 184) agreed with the four amendments the TAC recommended.

The IFRS Foundation's trustees announced it on 3 November 2021 at COP26.

It issued IFRS S1 and IFRS S2 in June 2023, effective internationally for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2024 — a date that never applied to UK SRS.

The IFRS Foundation said in June 2026 that over 40 jurisdictions have decided to use or are taking steps to introduce them.

In February 2026 it said requirements had already come into effect in 19 jurisdictions.

Its figures put the adopting jurisdictions at more than 40% of global market capitalisation.

The UK is listed as a snapshot, not a full profile.

No. A new or amended ISSB standard has to go through the UK endorsement process before it applies here.

The ISSB's December 2025 amendments to IFRS S2 were built into UK SRS S2 from the start because the UK text was issued after them.

UK SRS S2 requires Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions.

Under the FCA's final rules that requirement, like every other, is comply or explain, and a listed company may use a one-year relief from disclosing Scope 3.

A company using a relief states that it is doing so and needs to give no further explanation during the relief period.

No. UK SRS S2 ¶B30 requires Scope 2 to be disclosed on a location-based approach and asks for information about contractual instruments only where they exist and matter.

The GHG Protocol Scope 2 Guidance asks for dual reporting; UK SRS S2 does not.

The GHG Protocol Corporate Standard, unless a jurisdictional authority or an exchange requires another method.

UK SRS S2 ¶C3 lets an entity keep another method it used immediately before for the first annual period, and the FCA allows the same for one year.

None in particular.

UK SRS S2 ¶B29 prescribes no factors and asks for those that best represent the entity's activity.

UK companies commonly use the government's annual conversion factors for company reporting.

No. UK SRS S2 expects Scope 3 to be measured largely by estimation. ¶¶B38 to B57 set a framework that prioritises direct measurement, value-chain-specific data, timely and relevant data and verified data, and ¶B47 prefers primary data only all else being equal.

Industry-average secondary data is acceptable (¶B49).

Yes.

UK SRS S2 ¶22 requires resilience to be assessed using scenario analysis, by an approach commensurate with the entity's circumstances.

A highly exposed entity with the skills and resources must use a more advanced quantitative approach (¶B17), and the resilience assessment is updated every reporting period even if the analysis follows the planning cycle (¶B18).

UK SRS S2 names none, so the choice and its justification are part of the disclosure.

The NGFS scenarios, currently version 5.0 of November 2024, are the central-bank reference set; the IEA Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario in World Energy Outlook 2025 is the energy-sector reference; the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report is the underlying science.

In practice yes.

Scenario sets are reissued: the IEA's NZE in World Energy Outlook 2025 peaks at around 1.65 °C before returning below 1.5 °C by 2100, which earlier editions did not.

A scenario cited without its edition cannot be checked or repeated.

Physical risk is the effect of the climate itself — acute events such as floods and storms, and chronic shifts such as heat and water stress.

Transition risk is the effect of the response to climate change: policy, technology, markets and reputation.

A scenario that lowers one usually raises the other.

No. UK SRS S2 ¶34(a) asks whether a target and its methodology were validated by a third party, and ¶36 asks for each greenhouse gas target's gases, scopes, whether it is gross or net, and planned use of carbon credits.

A net target must be accompanied by its gross target.

No. UK SRS S2 requires disclosure of the climate-related targets an entity has set and any it is required by law or regulation to meet, with their basis, scope and progress, and information about any transition plan.

What target to set is the entity’s own decision; a company with a net target must also disclose the associated gross target.

No. SECR asks for at least one intensity ratio.

UK SRS S2 asks for cross-industry metrics and the entity's own targets but prescribes no particular ratio.

No. Energy use in kWh is a SECR requirement under SI 2018/1155.

UK SRS S2 asks for greenhouse gas emissions, which is one reason the two reports are not interchangeable even though they share data.

In the annual financial report.

UK SRS S1 ¶60 makes the disclosures part of general purpose financial reports, and the FCA kept the requirement for the disclosures or explanations to be in the annual report, allowing cross-reference where UK SRS S1 permits it (¶¶B45 to B47).

UKLR 6.6.6R(8)(c) requires the company to say where they are.

UK SRS S1 ¶¶20 to 24 and ¶64 require the disclosures to be for the same reporting entity and period as the financial statements, published at the same time, with consistent data and assumptions and the same presentation currency.

In practice it puts sustainability data on the finance team’s timetable and under its controls.

Yes.

UK SRS S1 ¶64 requires them at the same time as, and for the same period as, the related financial statements, and ¶20 for the same reporting entity. ¶24 requires the same presentation currency.

Not under UK SRS.

IFRS S1 ¶E4 allowed that in the first year and it was removed from UK SRS S1, so the disclosures travel with the financial statements from the first report.

UK SRS S1 ¶23 requires data and assumptions to be consistent with the financial statements, to the extent the accounting framework allows.

An inconsistency between a scenario assumption and an impairment assumption becomes visible, and has to be explained.

No. UK SRS S1 ¶E1 and UK SRS S2 ¶C1 relieve the first year, and the FCA's transitional guidance says the same for the first period under its rules.

Comparative non-climate information is needed only in the second period after the climate-only relief stops being used (¶E4(b)).

No. PS26/19 sets no requirement to tag sustainability disclosures digitally.

The existing tagging duty in DTR 4.1.18R applies to IFRS consolidated financial statements.

The government confirmed that UK SRS disclosures placed in the strategic report are covered by the protective provisions of section 463 of the Companies Act 2006.

The protection follows location: disclosures outside the strategic report are not covered unless section 463 is widened.

UK SRS S1 ¶¶83 to 86 deal with correcting prior-period errors, and ¶52 requires metrics to be defined consistently over time, with ¶B52 governing a redefinition.

A change of GHG method in the first year has its own relief at UK SRS S2 ¶C3.

No. The FCA's final rules require a listed company to state whether it obtained third-party assurance and, if it did, the provider, which disclosures were assured and to what level, and which standards were used.

The FCA says it will keep the case for mandatory assurance under review.

ISSA (UK) 5000, issued by the FRC on 12 November 2025, is for voluntary use.

No. The standards say nothing about assurance, and the FCA’s rules ask only whether third-party assurance was obtained and, if so, from whom, over what, at what level and to which standards.

The audit of the financial statements is a separate engagement and gives no assurance opinion on the sustainability disclosures.

The government has said it has no plans at this stage to require assurance over UK SRS reporting.

None is required.

If a company obtains assurance it says whether it was limited or reasonable.

Limited assurance gives a negative-form conclusion; reasonable assurance gives a positive opinion and needs controlled, repeatable evidence.

No. Neither the standards nor the FCA's rules create a certification scheme.

What exists is assurance: an independent practitioner's conclusion, which the FCA asks a listed company to disclose if it has one, and which a practitioner may perform under ISSA (UK) 5000.

No. The FCA says it is not requiring listed companies to produce transition plans.

A UKLR 6, 16 or 22 company states whether it has published a climate transition plan and where, or why not; UKLR 14 and 15 companies make no such statement.

No. UK SRS S2 ¶14(a)(iv) asks for information about any transition plan the entity has.

Whether having one becomes a duty is the subject of a separate DESNZ consultation, which closed on 17 September 2025 with no government response published.

None is required.

The Transition Plan Taskforce's Disclosure Framework of October 2023, now hosted by the IFRS Foundation, sets three principles — Ambition, Action and Accountability — across five elements.

The IFRS Foundation's guidance of 23 June 2025 explains how to disclose transition information under IFRS S2 and adds no requirements.

No. SECR continues under SI 2018/1155 and UK SRS does not replace it.

The Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation proposes removing the directors' report, which would move where SECR sits in the annual report, and DESNZ intends to consult on SECR and ESOS later in 2026; both are proposals, not law.

No. ESOS runs under SI 2014/1643 on its own four-year cycle; the Phase 4 qualification date is 31 December 2026 and notification of compliance is due by 5 December 2027.

UK SRS changes nothing about it.

For listed companies, yes: PS26/19 replaces the TCFD-aligned listing-rule disclosures with UK SRS.

The TCFD itself disbanded in October 2023.

Its four recommendations and eleven recommended disclosures of June 2017 are the frame IFRS S2, and therefore UK SRS S2, is built on.

UK SRS S2 is recognised as a national reporting framework for section 414CB(6), so a company already reporting against it can use it for the Companies Act climate-disclosure duty.

No duty to apply UK SRS has been made under the Act; the government has said only that it will consider how UK SRS should be reflected in it.

The government programme set out in written statement HCWS973 of 21 October 2025, which calls it Modernisation of Corporate Reporting, and consulted on from 7 September to 30 November 2026.

The consultation proposes removing the directors' report, reshaping the strategic report and consulting on a "very large company" category without giving thresholds.

It proposes nothing on UK SRS beyond considering how it should sit in the Companies Act.

Nothing proposes that.

The 2026 post-implementation review recommended keeping SECR with amendments, and the Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation would move where it sits rather than remove it.

UK SRS uses financial materiality; the EU's CSRD and ESRS use double materiality, adding the entity's impacts on people and the environment.

UK SRS reaches listed companies through comply-or-explain listing rules; the CSRD is a directive transposed into member-state law.

The Commission adopted a revised ESRS set on 3 July 2026.

No. UK SRS S1 covers sustainability generally and UK SRS S2 covers climate.

There are no UK SRS standards for water, biodiversity, workforce or governance.

The FRC was the secretariat to the Technical Advisory Committee that recommended endorsement, issues ISSA (UK) 5000 and the Guidance on the Strategic Report, and will monitor UK SRS disclosures by listed companies alongside the FCA. It does not issue UK SRS.

The FCA's Primary Market Bulletin 66 encourages listed companies to understand the requirements, identify financially material sustainability and climate risks and opportunities, review governance, integrate those risks into strategy, assess resilience, develop the data, metrics and targets, set internal controls, build capability, and engage investors. These are the FCA's encouragement, not rules.

Start from the data you already hold for SECR and TCFD reporting, decide early which reliefs you will rely on because they change what you may claim, and put the disclosures on the finance timetable, since they must be published with the accounts.

Where a requirement cannot be met, the rules allow an explanation instead.

The rules are final; only the guidance on explanations is still in draft, with comments due by 28 October 2026 and the FCA aiming to finalise it before 1 January 2027.

The inventory, governance trail and Scope 3 screening a first report needs do not depend on that guidance.

We do not publish prices.

The FCA's own cost-benefit analysis estimates the net present value of its final rules at £174.10m over ten years, and models average incremental costs per large issuer that complies in full at £127,900 one-off and £194,700 a year over TCFD-aligned reporting. Those are the FCA's modelled averages, not prices.

On GOV.UK.

The publication page carries UK SRS S1, UK SRS S2 and the government response with Annex A, free and without registration.

The FCA's PS26/19 page carries the Policy Statement and the made rules.

Yes.

UK SRS S1, UK SRS S2 and the government response with Annex A are published on GOV.UK at no cost and without registration, and the FCA publishes PS26/19 and the made rules free on its website.

There is no single document.

DBT’s guidance page covers the standards’ status; the FCA’s draft Technical Note 803.1, in Primary Market Bulletin 66, covers how to explain; the FRC publishes FAQs and its Guidance on the Strategic Report; and the IFRS Foundation publishes guidance on transition plan disclosures. Each covers the part its publisher owns.

No regulator publishes a timetable, and we do not give one.

The fixed point is the annual financial report, due within four months of the year end under DTR 4.1.3R, because the disclosures must be published with it.

The data for the reporting year has to exist by then, which is why the inventory and governance work usually starts well before the year it covers.

For what the standards require, the standards themselves and Annex A. For what a listed company must do, PS26/19 and the made rule text in its Appendix 1.

For how to explain, draft TN 803.1 — labelled as draft until the FCA finalises it.

Two standards, UK SRS S1 and S2, based on the ISSB's IFRS S1 and S2 with the differences in Annex A, published on 25 February 2026 for voluntary use, and applied by the FCA to listed companies in five categories on a comply-or-explain basis for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027.

No. UKSRS.ORG.UK is an independent reference.

It states what the standards, the rules and the consultations say, with a link to each source, and it is not legal, accounting or investment advice on your own position.

When a primary source changes.

The last-verified date at the foot of the page and the dateModified in its structured data move together, and only when there is a real edit behind them.