(a) Explain，using accounting as an example，what ‘the public interest’ means as used by Mrs Yttria in her speech. (5 marks)

　　(b) This requirement concerns ethical threats. It is very important for professional accountants to be aware of ethical threats and to avoid these where possible.

　　Required：

　　(i) With reference to the case as appropriate，describe five types of ethical threat. (5 marks)

　　(ii) Assess the ethical threats implied by Mr Mordue’s beliefs. (8 marks)

　　(c) Assess Ivor Nahum’s remarks about the accounting profession in the light of Gray，Owen & Adams’ deep green (or deep ecologist) position on social responsibility. (7 marks)

　　(25 marks)

　　3 TQ Company，a listed company，recently went into administration (it had become insolvent and was being managed by a firm of insolvency practitioners).A group of shareholders expressed the belief that it was the chairman，Miss Heike Hoiku，who was primarily to blame. Although the company’s management had made a number of strategic errors that brought about the company failure，the shareholders blamed the chairman for failing to hold senior management to account. In particular，they were angry that Miss Hoiku had not challenged chief executive Rupert Smith who was regarded by some as arrogant and domineering. Some said that Miss Hoiku was scared of Mr Smith.

　　Some shareholders wrote a letter to Miss Hoiku last year demanding that she hold Mr Smith to account for a number of previous strategic errors. They also asked her to explain why she had not warned of the strategic problems in her chairman’s statement in the annual report earlier in the year. In particular，they asked if she could remove Mr Smith from office for incompetence. Miss Hoiku replied saying that whilst she understood their concerns，it was difficult to remove a serving chief executive from office.

　　Some of the shareholders believed that Mr Smith may have performed better in his role had his reward package been better designed in the first place. There was previously a remuneration committee at TQ but when two of its four non-executive members left the company，they were not replaced and so the committee effectively collapsed. Mr Smith was then able to propose his own remuneration package and Miss Hoiku did not feel able to refuse him. He massively increased the proportion of the package that was basic salary and also awarded himself a new and much more expensive company car. Some shareholders regarded the car as ‘excessively’ expensive. In addition， suspecting that the company’s performance might deteriorate this year，he exercised all of his share options last year and immediately sold all of his shares in TQ Company.