Elbert Dijkgraaf, Professor of Empirical Economics of the public sector at Erasmus School of Economics, is one of the three members of the committee that is to prepare new interventions in the accountancy sector. The announcement was made by Dutch Minister of Finance Wopke Hoekstra on Tuesday, 18 December 2018.
Together with Chairperson Professor Annetje Ottow (Utrecht University) and researcher Marlies de Vries (Nyenrode University), Dijkgraaf will publish the committee’s report by the end of 2019 at the latest on how the quality of statutory audits can be improved and which legislative amendments this requires.
With the committee established by the Minister of Finance, the accountancy sector loses the initiative in the reforms. A series of accounting and financial scandals, such as the Vestia affair and the construction of the new KPMG head office, have tarnished the image of accountants in the past few years. Politicians, investors and the Dutch supervisory body AFM (Authority Financial Markets) repeatedly criticised the sector, urging the professional group to change. For instance, the partner model of the big firms and the combination of auditing and advice within one organisation came in for criticism.
- Professor