At the risk of being highly controversial, and in the knowledge that there are hundreds of thousands of people in the UK either already, or likely to be facing economic hardship, I wanted to write a post about why I think recession is a good thing. Of course, we haven’t in pure economic terms, actually [...]
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With public monies hardly being in abundance at the moment, I read with some amusement and bewilderment, an article inThe Times about an NHS Trust that wants to spend £400,000 on a yacht. The East Yorkshire Trust, now known as NHS Hull, is proposing the expenditure to help raise standards of public health in the [...]
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Ever since 1993, Companies’ legislation has allowed those below a certain size limit (by reference to turnover, gross assets and number of employees) to forgo their annual audit – the check by independent, fully-qualified auditors – to ensure that the annual financial accounts were reasonably stated and not misleading. Over the past 15 years or [...]
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One of the frustrations that my colleagues in the accounting profession and I – and indeed everyone I come across in business – face, is the increasing burden of regulation. It does not matter whether this is in relation to the running of our own business – that of a Chartered Accountancy practice – or [...]
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“….lascivious, boozy, flash and tasteless, ignorant of all but money and fast horses and the pleasure of town…… His was ‘an easy come easy go’ existence that had once seemed to be the province only of aristocrats and plutocrats but has now filtered down to the sons of tradesman and attorneys and quacks”. Anyone reading [...]
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I am positive I am not alone in stating that despite all this financial turmoil, there is a certain amount of salacious pleasure to be derived from seeing banks and bankers getting their comeuppance. The Germans of course have just the perfect word for this, “schadenfreude” – taking malicious satisfaction in another persons troubles [...]
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Last Tuesday, I received a call from my bank in connection with my credit card asking to check the validity of certain transactions. One in particular, a mobile top up at Tesco’s, was patently fraudulent as none of my family have top up mobiles. Unfortunately, this is now the 3rd time I have had to [...]
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Hardly a day seems to pass without some more disturbing news in the financial markets. Last week was one of the most turbulent, volatile and depressing weeks in the sector. Despite various attempts by world governments, financial regulatory originations and individual financial institutions, the stock markets worldwide plummeted as the world’s banking system seemed to [...]
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The bail-out of customers of Northern Rock, Bradford & Bingley and now Icesave , has brought complaints from those who lost out in the so-called ‘pension scandal’ and from Equitable Life policy holders. With hindsight, we can point the blame at excessive greed of bankers or poor regulation by the FSA and poor ability to [...]
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I suspect that few of our contacts are regular readers of Accountancy magazine. Nevertheless, it does provide fertile ground for me in finding topics to write about. Additionally, now and then, it actually helps me professionally! One section of this historic publication, which I never miss, reports on professional standards. The page lists disciplinary and [...]
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