A letter to the Financial Times Editor:
From Mr Timothy Copnell.
Sir, I was encouraged by the "housekeeping" changes to the Combined Code proposed by the Association of British Insurers ("Low level of compliance with new governance code", October 12), but to suggest that companies have not taken huge steps towards compliance with the new Code is slightly misleading.
The ABI's report shows that 54 per cent of FTSE 100 companies were not in full compliance. What it does not show is that these "non-compliant" companies failed to comply with no more than about 130 provisions out of 4,800. Put another way, FTSE 100 companies complied with more than 97 per cent of Code provisions. Given that companies are encouraged to explain deviations, rather than comply for the sake of compliance, I suggest that such a high level of compliance is extremely positive.
Timothy Copnell,
Director, Audit Committee Institute,
KPMG,
London EC4Y 8BB
See Letters page.
Posts
