MPs to grill FRC over going concern

TWO LEADING REGULATORS will face MPs today to discuss the FRC’s slow progress in implementing recommendations on going concern, alongside wider corporate governance issues.

As previously revealed by Accountancy Age, Sir Win Bischoff and Stephen Haddrill, the watchdog’s chairman and chief executive, will face the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee at 3.30pm today to answer questions over controversial proposals on going concern.

A third consultation into the regulator’s interpretation of the Sharman Review findings closed last month. Investors subsequently described the plans as “damaging to the public.

If the current plans are accepted, changes to going concern will go live in October this year, along with amendments to remuneration policy in the latest UK Corporate Governance Code update.

In January, David Pitt-Watson, a key member of the Sharman inquiry, warned the FRC was in danger of departing from some of the panel’s original recommendations.

In an email sent to investors and institutional representatives seen by Accountancy Age, Pitt-Watson urged them to take part in the consultation after the definition of going concern had drifted from its common sense meaning to one that only applies to its technical use.