Regulation not the answer to SMSF auditor independence
Being made to adhere to professional and ethical standards will do more for ensuring the independence of self-managed super fund (SMSF) auditors than further regulation.
Speaking at the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia national SMSF conference in Sydney yesterday, the chairperson of the Accounting Professional and Ethical Standards Board, Kate Spargo, said increasing regulatory requirements for auditors was not necessarily the answer.
“More regulation may not be as important as influencing people to believe that there is a benefit to compliance with what is already in place,” she said.
Some 95 per cent of SMSF auditors in Australia are members of the institute or one of the other two professional accounting bodies and are required to adhere to professional and ethical standards, including specific standards around independence, the institute stated.
The institute’s head of superannuation, Liz Westover, said the best way to ensure all service providers in the sector adhered to appropriate independence principles was to apply these standards to 100 per cent of SMSF auditors.
“There are always improvements that can be made in any sector,” she said. “Making improvements within the existing regulatory framework for SMSF auditors would be a better approach to ensuring the integrity of independence than setting a whole new set of standards, as recommended by the Cooper Review.”
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