ACCA hits back over Gardiner
ACCA has hit back at criticism over the institute's removal of president-elect Ray Gardiner and the appointment of lawyer Michael Steiner to conduct a probe into the Robert Jackson disciplinary case.
Breaking the silence which has descended over ACCA in recent weeks, a senior source defended the association’s actions over Gardiner as inevitable, given the president-elect’s inability to substantiate part of his witness statement on cross-examination during the Jackson affair.
Gardiner was forced out of office on the day he was to become president and friends have claimed the Jackson case was used as an excuse to remove a reformer.
But the source said: ‘If he had not given evidence, the issue would never have come up. We had no choice but to put the facts before council.’
He also dismissed critics of Michael Steiner, the lawyer appointed to examine the actions of those involved in the Jackson case, and questioned why some members now felt him to be inappropriate to lead the review when they had welcomed his initial appointment.
Last week, Tony Cruse expressed his disappointment that Steiner, a chairman of ACCA’s appeals committee, had been chosen to carry out the review despite his two-year attachment to the institute.
But the source maintained that Steiner was chosen because his knowledge of ACCA would allow him to review what was considered to be ‘normal’ procedure and identify more quickly whether this had been followed during the Jackson case. He said ACCA was simply ’emulating a public limited company and serving its customers better’.