Accountants Must Accept Share Of Blame For Financial Crisis, Expert Warns

Wed, 08 Oct 2008

Accountants have been told to accept their share of the blame for the current financial markets crisis, according to reports in the Guardian.

In an article for the newspaper, the president of the ACCA Aitken-Davies, wrote that accountants "haven't said no enough" when confronted by short-termist accounting and questionable risk management at some of the major financial institutions.

He also singled out independent non executive directors for criticism, writing: "If directors ignored bad habits, if they accepted complacency after a prolonged bull market then they should be held accountable."

"If they have overseen failure, and allowed greed to flourish then they are accountable for this, too," Aitken-Davies added.

The ACCA head called for a rethink on corporate governance as something had gone "seriously wrong" with it and for remuneration and incentivisation packages to be redrawn.

He also insisted that it was important to hold those responsible to account in court .
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