Accounting, Business, Legal business, Legal Practice Management
Leave a comment

More guidance needed over role of in-house legal counsel, say accountants and lawyers

The accounting and legal community is calling on the Auditing and Assurance Standards Board and the Canadian Bar Association to provide more guidance over the role of in-house legal counsel in an exposure draft designed to assist auditors, law firms and management to communicate effectively with each other over audit inquiries.

The exposure draft, two years in the making, updates the existing Joint Policy Statement (JPS) to reflect developments in accounting and auditing standards as well as in the legal environment since the original statement was issued in 1978. The JPS covers situations when auditors request management to prepare an inquiry letter to send to an entity’s law firm to confirm the fairness of management’s evaluation of the entity’s claims. It is intended to protect solicitor-client confidentiality and privilege while ensuring that auditors have access to sufficient appropriate information to fulfil their professional responsibility in conducting the audit of the entity’s financial statements.

Read More

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *