ACCA welcomes the opportunity to comment on the proposals issued by the FRC. We are pleased to note that the proposed changes reflect significant developments in the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA) Code since the FRC last revised the Ethical Standard in 2019 to ensure that the UK’s Ethical Standard mirrors as closely as possible the international code.
We are supportive of the revisions and updates to the FRC’s Ethical Standard (ES) to enhance prohibitions where an audit firm’s independence could be threatened by an economic over reliance on fees from specific entities that are connected, and the changes related to prohibitions to reflect relevant findings from audit inspections and enforcement cases. Our comments align with our previous response in 2019 and we continue to support the effort made by the FRC in restructuring and simplifying the standard. We do, however, have some detailed concerns with some of the proposed changes and these are reflected in our response to the specific questions below. We further note that additional guidance outside of the ES will facilitate consistent application of the updated standards.
To read the response in full, please download the consultation response document on this page.