Report
on the activity of
EUROSAI Goal Team 2
“Professional Standards”
Cristina Breden
Audit Director at The Romanian Court of Accounts
Member of INTOSAI’s Compliance Audit Subcommittee
and of EUROSAI’s Goal Team 2 “Professional Standards”
I. EUROSAI STRATEGIC GOALS 2011-2017

The EUROSAI Strategic Plan 2011-2017 was adopted at the
VIII EUROSAI Congress 2011 in Lisbon, Portugal.

Four Goal Teams have been introduced to implement the four
strategic goals:




Goal 1 „Capacity Building“ - Facilitate the development and the
strengthening of institutional capacity of EUROSAI members”
Goal 2 „Professional Standards“ - Promote and facilitate the
implementation of the International Standards of Supreme Audit
Institutions (ISSAI) and contribute to their further development
Goal 3 „Knowledge Sharing“ - Encourage cooperation and
exchange of experience among EUROSAI members, within INTOSAI
and with external partners”
Goal 4 „Governance“ - Manage EUROSAI in accordance with the
principles of good governance and effective communication
II. Structure of the Goal Team 2
The Professional Standards Team or Goal Team 2
( GT 2 ) has been created to implement strategic goal 2.
Chair:
SAI of Germany
Members:
SAIs of Austria, Belgium, Former Yugoslavian Republic of
Macedonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal,
Romania, Russian Federation, Slovakia, Ukraine
Invited experts:
SAIs of Azerbaijan, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Sweden
Goal Team 2 – inaugural meeting in Bonn in October 2011
III. Objectives of GT 2



to promote the implementation of the International
Standards of Supreme Audit Institutions (ISSAI) and
INTOSAI Guidance on Good Governance (INTOSAI GOV) as a
relevant part of the capacity building process within the Organisation
with due regard of the independence of each individual EUROSAI
member to determine its own approach consistent with national
legislation.
to encourage provision of these standards and guidelines in
all official EUROSAI languages and, if feasible, in other national
languages. It also promotes their use and discussions on further
refining methodologies.
to ensure that the ISSAI and INTOSAI GOV remain up-todate and relevant by feeding back experiences to the INTOSAI PSC
and its Sub-committees as well as to other standard-setting bodies
within INTOSAI and its Regional Working Groups.
IV. The key tasks and responsibilities of
Goal Team 2 “Professional Standards”:
1. Raise awareness of the ISSAI and INTOSAI GOV:
Encourage high quality translation (Russian is also EUROSAI
working language);

Publish articles/presentations/expert blogs;

Conduct awareness raising seminars.
2. Support EUROSAI members in implementing the ISSAI and
INTOSAI GOV:

Identify needs in implementing ISSAI;

Organise seminars and workshops;

Promote the use of relevant professional materials.
3. Contribute to the further development of the ISSAI and
INTOSAI GOV:

Providing information and feedback from EUROSAI;

Taking an active role within the PSC.
Since its inaugural meeting in October 2011, Goal Team 2 has taken a
number of actions to implement these tasks.

V. Main results achieved:
1) Survey on the application of ISSAI within EUROSAI was
carried out
Goal Team 2 conducted a survey on the implementation of the ISSAI
within EUROSAI. About 75% of EUROSAI member SAIs (37 out of 50)
responded to the questionnaire. Two SAIs informed that they were
already applying the ISSAI, 35 SAIs (70% of the EUROSAI community)
returned the completed questionnaire.
Most EUROSAI members already apply the ISSAI, usually a specific
part of the framework. The following ISSAI levels have key priority:
a)
Founding principles.
b)
Prerequisites for the functioning of SAIs.
c)
Fundamental auditing principles.
At level 4, focus is placed on the implementation guidelines on
financial, performance and compliance audit. Most SAIs use them as a
basis to develop or revise audit manuals and guidelines.
V. Main results achieved:
1) Survey on the application of ISSAI within EUROSAI was
carried out
The main obstacles for applying the ISSAI are limited human
resources, followed by financial reasons and language problems.
To solve these problems, SAIs rely on various strategies: SAIs conduct
training, translate the ISSAI in their national languages, adapt their audit
manuals to the ISSAI. In addition, they cooperate with other SAIs in the
framework of INTOSAI and EUROSAI. SAIs consider a top priority support
for the application of the ISSAI with regard to ISSAI level 4, and the
INTOSAI Gov. The forms of support that SAIs appreciate most are
seminars, cooperation or consulting with other SAIs and guidelines,
handbooks or good practice examples.
Besides the official EUROSAI languages, several ISSAI have also been
translated into 16 other national languages (Azerbaijani, Bosnian,
Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Dutch, Estonian, Hungarian, Lithuanian,
Macedonian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Serbian, and
Slovak). Parts of these translations are available on the respective SAIs’
websites.
V. Main results achieved:
2) ISSAI translated into Russian.
One of the main activities was the translation of ISSAI into
Russian. The Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation is
providing the Russian ISSAI translations. Goal Team 2 will
publish the Russian ISSAI translations on the EUROSAI Website.
V. Main results achieved:
3) Needs of EUROSAI members in implementing the ISSAI
and the need for a second awareness raising seminar were
assessed.
As the large majority of SAIs already apply the ISSAI, it was
concluded that there is no need for a second/follow-up awareness raising
seminar. Rather than that, Goal Team 2 would like to focus on providing
support to the EUROSAI members in implementing the ISSAI.
Therefore, Goal Team 2 has liaised with the INTOSAI Development
Initiative in launching their “ISSAI Implementation Initiative”, called “3i
Programme”.
Nine EUROSAI members participate in this global programme: the
SAIs of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Kazakhstan, the Former
Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia, Moldavia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine.
V. Main results achieved:
4) “Relevant” professional material was defined.
Goal Team 2 started to focus on collecting and disseminating
to EUROSAI members any relevant guidelines, handbooks and
good practice examples on the application of ISSAI.
5) An ISSAI column
established.
in EUROSAI Magazine was
6) Information on GT2 progress are provided in
EUROSAI Newsletters.
V. Main results achieved:
7) Goal Team 2 would like to enhance cooperation with bodies of
EUROSAI and INTOSAI, especially the Professional Standards
Committee and its sub-committees, as well as with external partners.
Cooperation with the European Confederation of Institutes of Internal
Auditing (ECIIA) was already established and will start with
implementation of INTOSAI GOV 9150 “Coordination and Cooperation
between SAIs and Internal Auditors in the Public Sector”.
A GT 2 Task group (SAIS of Belgium and Germany) proposed an
action plan to ECIIA. First activity: to develop an implementation
document (to be confirmed after ECIIA management board meeting);
could be accomplished by 2014. Further steps (joint publications/training
event) will be discussed after the Memorandum of understanding will be
revised in 2014.
V. Main results achieved:
8) Seminar on applying the ISSAI on Performance Audit on 45 December 2013.
9) Cooperation between EUROSAI and ASOSAI:
A Memorandum of understanding was signed in September 2011.
ASOSAI wishes to share information on training, knowledge sharing
programmes, experts and to invite each other’s experts to training events.
GT 2 is willing to share any information ASOSAI might ask for and to invite
ASOSAI experts to training events.
10) At GT2’s initiative, The EUROSAI Governing Board
decided to ask the INTOSAI Governing Board to include the
classification of ISSAI X in the agenda of its 64th meeting, to
reconsider the decision to classify ISSAI X on the level 1 of the
ISSAI framework and to decide on the appropriate classification
of ISSAI X.
VI. The GT2 members were also informed
on the following aspects:
a) The PSC is focused on:
 Implementing the ISSAI in cooperation with IDI;
 Elaborating guidance (together with its Sub-committees and
project groups);
 Assuring quality of the ISSAI;
 Revising the level 4 ISSAI (after 2013).
b) SAI Denmark will resign as PSC chair by the end of 2016.
c) SAI Sweden will resign after 18 years as FAS chair, after
the INCOSAI 2013.
d) The revision of ISSAI will be performed: level 2 every 915 years, level 3 every 9 years.
VI. The GT2 members were also informed
on the following aspects:
e) Activity carried out by the EUROSAI GT4 Task Force
Audit & Ethics chaired by the SAI of Portugal.
The goals of the Task Force are to:
 Contribute to raise public confidence in SAIs by supporting
the implementation of ISSAI 30 (Code of Ethics).
 Promote ethical conduct in public organisations through the
SAIs´ activities.
Two seminars are planned (Sept. 2013 and Jan. 2014).
Comparative study was prepared on formal commitments,
mandate, management practices, training etc.
f) ISSAI 30 might be revised after 2013 and will be more
detailed.
g) Further ISSAIs will be revised after INCOSAI 2013,
when the underlying ISAs will be revised.
VI. The GT2 members were also informed
on the following aspects:
h) International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board
 a new ISA on disclosure which might lead to a new ISSAI;
 audit quality framework from auditees’ perspective  might be
interesting for SAIs.
i) The Project on Audit Quality Control has developed guidance
material (gap analysis tool) for the implementation of ISSAI 40
“Quality Control for SAIs”;
j) Documents on performance audit can be found on the website
of the Performance Audit Subcommittee (PAS) (http://www.pscintosai.org/composite-239.htm).
k) SAIs of the Baltic & Nordic countries & Poland organized
an experts meeting on challenges and opportunities in
implementing ISSAI. Presentations are available on the website of the
Estonian SAI.
VII. The next EUROSAI GT2 annual
meeting
This will be hosted by SAI Hungary on the 11-12th of
November 2013.
According to the agenda of this venue, SAI Lithuania made
a proposal to host in 2014 a Seminar on Compliance Audit
Standards.
Thank you
for your
attention!