In the wake of the Enron and WorldCom financial scandals, Hewitt has already promised a review of audit regulations to ensure they could never happen in the UK but this weekend she went further.
Mrs Hewitt said: ‘What we have seen in America is a few individuals in a few companies, and one audit firm, behaving absolutely disgracefully and damaging people’s savings – not just in America.
‘More broadly, they have damaged people’s confidence in business as a whole.’She said that those directors found guilty of fraud should be prosecuted and punished with either fines or prison sentences.