Here is what the PCA Act says the SPCA was supposed be doing all along...

(4) Within 14 days after the annual general meeting, the society must file with the Registrar of Companies
(a) in respect of the society and each of its branches, audited financial statements, each in the form of a balance sheet containing general particulars of assets and liabilities, and a statement of income and expenditure

The SPCA finally defused this ugly, looming, P.R. disaster, perhaps a disaster even bigger than the $204,000 salary one. We wonder if there were rumblings from the government that were stirred up by the people the SPCA is so fond threatening with law suits? Why else would the SPCA break a 109 year-old tradition? It a reactive Society, not a leader.

The SPCA makes a distinction between then and now by saying the audited statement was a consolidateed statement, something it would have to do since restructuring in November 2001.

Prior to 2001, some SPCA branches followed the rules and gave Head Office audited statements, but not all, and Head Office didn't make them do it. And according to one of its own Treasurers, Head Office itself never submitted audited statements to Victoria.