One of the roles of key roles of The 2020 Group is to be an advocate for progressive small and medium sized accountants. In the U.K., 2020 has been a meaningful voice to accounting regulators, on behalf of the little guys; and improvements have been won as a result!! 

While 2020 strives to serve the needs of accountants regardless of their designation as CAs, CGAs or CMAs, or their location across Canada , we have been asked to assist small and medium CAs "SME-CAs" in Ontario to gain a meaningful voice with the ICAO.   In order to begin this role a separate website sme-ca.com has been created.

If we are approached by other 2020 Members who want to accomplish something similar in their regions, we are happy to help.

The Key Issues:

1/ Several SME-CAs have clearly demonstrated that the ICAO is being run for the benefit of the larger CA firms.  (Click here for Board Membership stats) Approaches have been made to senior ICAO executives and members of its Governing Council by individual 2020 Members only to be told they had no valid issue (see Dec. 2007 article from The Bottom Line); and have been treated as malcontents. 

SME-CAs are actually the majority of all Ontario CAs.  Given the disappointing  response of ICAO officials to date, we believe that the only effective way to align the ICAO's direction with the goals of the majority of its members is to elect more SME-CAs to the Governing Council.  For this reason 2020 will be recommending up to four candidates for the next ICAO election and will be supporting these candidates through the SME-CA website. 

2/ While Ontario CAs regularly help their clients multiply the use of the $750,000 Small Business Corporation capital gains exemption, they are denied the same privilege themselves.  Click here for more. While the leaders of other professional bodies have worked hard to level the playing field for their Members, the ICAO leadership has been noting short of obstructive on this matter, with the result that ICAO Members who attempt to multiply the capital gains exemption in their accounting business are faced with possible professional misconduct.  This must change!

3/ Public accountants around the world have made significant inroads into the wealth management field in most major countries around the world.  This has been an important incremental source of revenue for those firms who choose to pursue this field and have been assisted by their professional bodies (i.e. http://pfp.aicpa.org/) and for the benefit of all of its members.  The ICAO leadership has been asked repeatedly to make it crystal clear what its members can and cannot do in this realm.  For over six years the members have been stonewalled.  This past fall it was learned that two national firms (both of whom have representatives on the ICAO Governing Council) received written approval from the ICAO in the past six years on how they can work with Investment Management firms and earn a portion of the resulting fee.  When a senior executive of the ICAO was asked for a copy of this approval letter, he said it was "proprietary".  What ever happened to Generally Accepted ---?  This bias must stop!!