Baroness Noakes (Con):...I have a particular interest in whether
the Bill applies to the Institute of Chartered Accountants in
England and Wales, of which I am a non-practising member. It is a
body governed by royal charter and the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria,
might like to know that it is not on the Minister’s list. Many
chartered accountants act as auditors and the ICAEW is a recognised
professional body and a recognised supervisory body for those
members who wish to practise as auditors....Request free trial
(Con):...I
have a particular interest in whether the Bill applies to the
Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, of which I
am a non-practising member. It is a body governed by royal charter
and the noble Lord, , might like to know that it is not on the Minister’s
list. Many chartered accountants act as auditors and the ICAEW is a
recognised professional body and a recognised supervisory body for
those members who wish to practise as auditors. The Financial Reporting Council which is on
the Minister’s list, oversees the regulation of auditors rather
than carrying it out itself. I believe a similar approach applies
to insolvency practitioners. Hence the Bill is rather complicated
in its scope, certainly for chartered accountants and, I imagine,
for other professions as well...
(Lab) [V]:...The Bill applies to 160 professions
that are regulated by legislation and a network of more than 50
regulators. This multiplicity of regulators results in duplication,
waste and obfuscation. For example, we have four professional
accountancy bodies, known as the recognised supervisory bodies, or
RSBs, dealing with external auditing. They are overseen by
the Financial Reporting Council soon
to become the audit, reporting and governance authority or
ARGA...
(LD):...The experience of my
professional body is that there will be times when the UK
Government’s involvement will be necessary for agreements between
UK and non-UK professional bodies, as happens. Reluctantly, I note
that government involvement might be needed, as a recognition
agreement may need approval by that profession’s regulator. For
accountancy, as has been mentioned, this is the Financial Reporting Council which
controls access to UK audit rights.
As we move beyond Second Reading, we need to consider
conflicting forces in any approach to recognition agreements. We
will want to be seen as open for business with the EU, despite
Brexit, and open to the rest of the world, thus replacing what has
been lost by exiting the single market.
However, there will be professional concern to recognise only
those who have met all legal requirements. Audit, as has been
mentioned, is a relevant case. I am informed that many overseas
professional institutes want deals that include UK audit rights,
but to date only two non-EU qualifications have ever been accepted
by the Financial Reporting Council both
of which are no longer available to new students...
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