New ACCA President elected
ACCA has elected Christopher Forster as its president. ACCA is the world's largest and fastest-growing international accountancy body with 105,000 members and 240,000 students in over 170 countries.
Christopher Forster is Director of Risk Management at Hermes Pensions Management Ltd. His senior City role reflects ACCA's growing strength in the financial services sector, with over 13,000 members. One of the new president's key priorities for the year will be to work with the Chief Executive to drive ACCA's on-going relationship with the European Commission over the future of financial regulation.
Christopher Forster said: "It is a great honour to become president at such an exciting time for ACCA. Last year saw unparalleled growth in students (67,800 new registrations globally) and members (6,300) and our aim is to match that again in the next year. This is at a time when other accounting bodies are turning to mergers to try to stem their falling numbers.
"We must ensure that our members, over half of whom are based outside the UK, continue to get good value for money for their subscriptions both in terms of services, and the credibility the ACCA qualification gives them. With the global trend to increased regulation, we are working extensively on our members' behalf to maintain positive and constructive working relationships with governments and regulators. We are also having increasing influence both when acting alone and through professional groupings."
Dennis Yeates, Deputy Director of Finance of the Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust becomes Deputy President, and Gillian Ball, Finance Director at the University of Birmingham becomes Vice-President.
Twelve positions on Council were filled in the elections, eight of which are returning Council members and four of whom are new members.
For more information please contact:
Ian Welch, Head of Corporate Communications ACCA 020 7396 5729/07739 862928