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ROBERT BRUCE Where’s the important legislation?
We live in a land where politicians produce more and more regulations. But if you look closely it is only regulations which the politicians think will get them re-elected. The useful stuff that would make life, particularly business life, better and more effective is shoved backwards. Take the Financial Reporting Council. Legislation has been promised for years to tighten up the interaction between auditor and business. A new regulator has been on the verge of legal existence for ages. Yet the legislation is delayed and delayed. There are no positive headlines, in fact no headlines at all, to be gained from corporate governance, audit effectiveness or business behaviours. So it gets left on the shelf at the back of the Government’s cupboard and a glance at the latest three-year plan from the FRC shows you the damage. It is still doing the necessary work, it produced a draft consultation on minimum standards for audit committees, for example. But the frustration at having to shove its three-year-plan forward by a year once a year because of government inaction must be driving them mad. In Germany, the relevant regulator has just banned EY from taking on any new business for two years over the astonishing Wirecard scandal. We are living in a period when all the misbehaviours during the slack pandemic period need to be dealt with. Oh well, leave it for another year just doesn’t cut it. Robert Br uce is an aw ard-winnin g wri ter on accountan cy for The Times
Manchester and Nottingham worst-hit by the talent crunch Accountancy firms in Manchester and Nottingham are bearing the brunt of the talent crisis, the Bright Financial Professionals Index (FPI) has revealed. There are, on average, just two potential applicants for every accounting role in each of these cities – so firms that are based there have the smallest talent pool from which to recruit. According to the index, Manchester had the secondhighest number of accountancy vacancies in the UK and Ireland at 2,884, after London, which had 5,810 vacancies. While there were more than 57,200 searches for
opportunities in the capital per month, comparably 5,840 people wanted to find equivalent roles in Manchester. Just over 1,400 accountancy roles were advertised in Nottingham – the sixth highest on the list – yet the number of searches for the city was a relatively
Hardest ACCA exam How hard were the March exams? Well, check out the Open Tuition Instant Poll table. When looking at it remember green is good (OK) and red bad (disaster). A quick look shows the
problem papers this time around were MA, FR, SBR, AAA and APM. The ‘better’ papers were LW, TX, AA and SBL. Students positively loved the SBL exam in
modest 3,227 per month. Liverpool, Leeds, Brighton and Sheffield all ranked lowest after Manchester and Nottingham, with an average of three job hunters per role – less than half the national average of seven. Cities like Carlisle (14 applicants), Norwich and Plymouth (13 applicants each), find themselves with more applicants per role. This is, however, still low when compared with available positions and leaves hiring managers with only a small pool of candidates to hire from. To find out more about Bright visit https://brightsg.com. March although one student told PQ magazine: “I have a strange feeling that this was too easy and I wrote too little.” ACCA students should also note that thinking an exam is easy often has no bearing of the exam pass rates, as 17 April has shown.
Narrow-scope amendments to IFRS 9 The International Accounting Standards Board is proposing narrow-scope amendments to the classification and measurement requirements for financial instruments IFRS 9 specifies how a company should classify and measure financial assets and financial liabilities. The Accounting Standard became effective in January 2018, introducing a new credit impairment model in light of the global financial crisis, and combining classification and
measurement requirements, impairment and hedge accounting to replace and improve on IAS 39 Financial Instruments: Recognition and Measurement. IASB chair Andreas Barckow (pictured) said: “The recent
post-implementation review of the requirements relating to classification and measurement in IFRS 9 indicated the standard is performing as intended, whilst also addressing some specific areas for enhancement. This exposure draft sets out our proposals in response to this feedback.” Check out the Snapshot of the proposals at: Snapshot of Exposure Draft: Amendments to the Classification and Measurement of Financial Instruments (ifrs.org).
In brief Accenture cuts jobs Accenture is to cut 19,000 jobs over the next 18 months in an effort to reduce costs. That amounts to around 3% of the entire workforce – it currently employs around 700,000 people in 120 countries. Accenture split from accountancy top five firm Arthur Andersen in 1989. Along with the jobs, the Dublinbased consultancy wants to reduce the amount of office space it occupies. However, while some jobs will go 6
Accenture said it will still be taking on people in areas of “strategic priorities”. Finance ‘holding back’ climate action Poorly targeted and insufficient finance means we are failing to meet targets for reducing global warming, says the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The new ground-
breaking UN report says financial support for developing countries from developed countries needs to be accelerated. Accountex ahoy! You shouldn’t need an excuse to visit Accountex on 10–11 of May at Excel in London, but we have found you a
really good one. Among this year’s exhibitors are the Accounting Pirates! On their website they say they are helping to change the general perception of accountants from boring to sexy… “out with the grey, and in with the data-driven, appsmart, automated practice!” There is even a podcast ‘Accountants Are Sexy, Change My Mind’ from Captain Kelli DoorneMillot. Go to https://tinyurl.com/ ys2bnru5 You can find them on stand SU4. PQ Magazine May 2023