Partly, it's true. I also suggest that the root of much of what's also wrong with internal audits is the bias of auditor training towards external techniques - in particular the accredited ones! Simply, if auditor training were focused in a similar manner to SSGB training, management would get results, whatever they expected...
As such I can vouch I really regret the focus on conformity to the standard's elements and the lack of focus on effectiveness. I call it the "kicking the tires" approach to auditing that's darned near a waste of time. But I find myself constantly having to defend the full-time audit approach, though I can point to many examples of one system audit "learning from the other" and my audits have been known to find issues where one fix can solve a problem affecting five different departments at once.
Sadly, I do not think there are all that many people who can do it the same way and now that I've been given document control etc., I am not able to do it as well either.
It all boils down to how much the organization's management values auditing. Last week, while sitting with the site's top managers in prep for this coming week's audit, I got a sick feeling while they chortled among each other about how they BS the auditor and draw out the time by wandering off into stories. I knew they didn't care all that much for the function, it's just hard to sit there and listen to it being displayed so openly.