Background

  1. In 2006, the Public Accountants Oversight Committee (PAOC) established an Ethics Sub-Committee with a specific mandate to review the existing Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics to ensure that it remains relevant in promoting the standards of the profession of public accountancy in Singapore.
  2. The PAOC Ethics Sub-committee has since completed its review and has submitted its preliminary recommendations to the PAOC.
  3. The PAOC Ethics Sub-Committee would now seek comments on an exposure draft of a proposed new “Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics for Public Accountants” (the “Proposed Code”) and a consultation document accompanying the Proposed Code. 

Scope of The Consultation Exercise

  1. The exposure draft is based on the “Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants” published by the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) in June 2005 (the IFAC Code). The exposure draft includes modifications to the IFAC Code proposed by the PAOC Ethics Sub-Committee in order to tailor the IFAC Code to the Singapore context, including areas where the sub-committee is of the view that greater clarity is needed for effective application.
  2. The sub-committee would like to seek the views of the public accountancy profession and stakeholders in the corporate reporting landscape on the Proposed Code.

Guidelines

  1.  We hope to obtain feedback on the exposure draft and consultation document. To facilitate a productive and focused consultation process, respondents are encouraged to:

    • Indicate your name as well as the organisation which you represent (if any);
    • Make a conscious attempt to phrase your comments in a clear and concise fashion;
    • Focus on the specific questions posed in the consultation document. Nevertheless, comments on any additional aspects pertaining to the code of ethics for public accountants would be welcome too.
  2. As the exposure draft and consultation paper are released only for the purposes of consultation, we would like to highlight that it would not be appropriate for these consultation documents to be used for individual or business decisions. Additionally, the content of these consultation documents should not be construed as any representation of actions that ACRA would undertake in future.   

Period of Consultation

  1. The exposure draft and consultation document are available for public consultation from 24 July 2007 to 24 September 2007.

Feedback Channel

  1. Please send us your comments via our Feedback Form.

Summary of Response

  1. As we will be publishing on ACRA’s website a summary of all comments received, we would like to highlight that all comments will be regarded as being on the public record unless request for confidentiality is expressly indicated in your feedback.

Consultation Documents

  1. For your convenience, the relevant documents relating to this consultation exercise can be downloaded for further reference: Consultation Document for the Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics (WORD, 267KB) / Exposure Draft. (WORD, 403KB)

About The Ethics Sub-Committee

  1. The Ethics Sub-Committee’s members are:

    Mr Quek See Tiat (Chairman), Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers 
    Mr Yang Ching Chao, Partner, C.C. Yang & Co 
    Mr Kon Yin Tong, Managing Partner, Foo Kon Tan Grant Thornton 
    Mr Michael Hwang, Senior Counsel  & Arbitrator 
    Mr Emmanuel Daniel, President & Editor in Chief, The Asian Banker

    Resource person: Mr Kwok Wui San, Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers

Did you find this page useful?
back to top