Eurostat D4 Feedback from outreach meetings First quarter 2012 Giovanna Dabbicco GFS Quality management and government accounting 26 April 2012

Main outreach activities in the 1st quarter 2012 IPSAS Board meeting - March 2012 Accrual Symposium held by Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) - March 2012 Bruegel Group - Finance focus breakfast on Accounting standards for government accounts - January 2012 IDW seminar “Financial reporting in the Public Sector: Tensions between National and International Developments” - March 2012 ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) conference on The Economic governance challenge in the EU - March 2012

Objectives of participation To promote the IPSAS assessment and obtain inputs from countries and stakeholders To engage in the debate in Europe on accounting matters

IPSAS Board Board meeting March 2012 Importance of participation: Role of Observers within the Board - follow proactively the development of IPSAS Some contributions for the assessment were received from countries participating at the meeting Discussions and drafting of many relevant papers that relate to the work of IPSAS/Accruals assessment: - IPSAS/GFS - First Time Adoption - Government Business Enterprises – not yet started

OECD Accruals Symposium Some countries experiences relevant for the IPSAS Study were presented and institutional accounting standards setters provided their updates There is a greater acceptance of accruals for financial reporting than for budgeting purposes There is an issue of independence of the standard-setters and the IPSASB governance Accrual adoption/implementation cannot be seen as a purely technical exercise. It needs to involve a “culture change” in government.

Other meetings on financial reporting in the Public Sector in the context of recent crisis IDW Seminar : Walter Radermacher (DG) provided an insight on IPSAS Study and promoted the IPSAS Public Consultation. BRUEGEL FINANCE FOCUS BREAKFAST and ACCA: in the context of the debate on the economic governance challenges, Eurostat discussed its enhanced role concerning data for economic governance and gave an overview of the IPSAS assessment.

What next? CESI - European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (Confédération européenne des syndicats indépendants) -Trade Council for Central Administrations and finances – 27 April 2012 FEE (the Federation of European Accountants) - Public Sector Committee – May 2012 London Conference of Commonwealth Secretariat – June 2012 IPSASB - June 2012 Thank you for your attention