With the arrival of fall draw near...

With the arrival of fall draw nears the start of the President's Tour. Visits to Trail, Cranbrook, Kelowna, Vernon, and Kamloops are planned for early October and to Vancouver Island later in the month I diocese these visits as one of my in the greatest degree important responsibilities during my year as presidentgiving me a chance to talk to you and hear your matters and to get your assessment of by what means well we're serving you as an Institute.

As well as bringing you up-to-date forward what's happening in the profession, Richard Ree FCA, and I will ask for your views upon the Institute's priorities and challenges. For instance, we plan to solicit your views upon Council's strategic objectives. Under the policy governance prototype adopted by Council as part of its re-governance proces these objectives are known as "ends" We want to make permanent you agree with the cessations we've chosen.

The Institute believes its primary responsibility to members is to support them in their chosen profession. To achieve this goal, Council has identified the following supporting ends:

Uphold the integrity of the CA designation.

Provide enough well-trained pupils

Support members in their search to be business advisors and assurance providers of choice.

Ensure that buyer of our services recognize the skills and services of CAs.

Integrity of the CA designation

Members behold upholding their designation's integrity as the Institute's greatest in quantity important priority. This we achieve mainly by means of our ethics and standards activities, the two of which have been reviewed extensively and updated above the last two years. However, it's equally important that our Act and bylaws not simply protect the public, but also support members' business activities.

We're hopeful that with a recent government, some necessary changes to our Act will come about Council has established a Task Force chaired by the agency of First VP Robin Elliott, FCA, to finalize the changes we're seeking. Among the issues being addressed are the use of the CPA designation in BC the licensing of firms, and appeals directly to the greatest possible Court instead of to Council Appeal bodies.

And of course, in its September meeting, Council formulated the ICABC's answer to the proposed new national commands addressing Conflict of Interest.

Enough Well-Trained pupils

Another important issue to members is the attractiveness of the profession. To maintain our position as the pre-eminent accounting designation in BC we ne a sufficient number of high-calibre potential members. Education reform initiatives have been masked regularly in Beyond Numbers and were spotlighted in the September 2001 screen and feature stories. Although these reforms should travel a long way towards improving the profession's attractiveness, Council believes more is stand in want ofed and has established a Task Force, chaired at second Vice President, John Cowperthwaite, CA, to address any barriers to the hiring of observers

Business Advisors and Assurance Providers of Choice

Here the Institute provides a supportive part to members by providing and supporting professional progression in a continuously ascending gradation and by providing information forward new CICA product development (see page 24) as well as onward national issues such as specialization.

With relate to to PD, we believe we ne to revisit our mandatory PD requirements for all members. At ready we are the only provincial institute without PD requirements for members outside of public practice, and the couple the major competing accounting bodies-the CGAs and CMAs-require mandatory PD for all of their members.

We also support members in consequence of our public policy advocacy program, using vehicles that focus onward the business climate, such as the BC Check-Up and the fiscal estimate submission.

Buyers Recognize the Skills and Services of CAs

Our public policy advocacy program is an important part of this objective as well. We forward the CA designation, the Institute, and its membership as an authoritative voice and opinion leader whose views should be sought forward all business and financial issues. Our goal is to make sure that business and government diocese us as people they must talk to.

Copyright Institute of Chartered Accountants of British Columbia Oct 2001

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