ABSTRACT
It is a very great pleasure to be here this morning, both for you and for me, at this session. The Seventh International Congress opened yesterday, as I think most of you were here, with a fine meeting, a fine opening session under the very strong leadership of Mr. Kraayenhof and with an inspiring keynote address by His Royal Highness the Prince of the Netherlands. And then last night we were made personally welcome, in this very room, by a reception and were greeted by Mr. and Mrs. Kraayenhof and by Prof, and Mrs. Van Rietschoten. And so we have opened the congress and we have been made welcome. To-day we are opening the business sessions of this Congress. Of course during this week we shall discuss many subjects of great interest to accountants and naturally we want to start with fundamentals. So this morning the session is to be devoted to the subject of the Principles for the Accountant’s Profession. In each of the countries that are represented here, these principles have evolved under the intelligent leadership of the accountants in those countries, and we are fortunate to have the essence of those principles distilled for us by a panel and in the papers that some of the panel members have written. Yesterday Prince Bernhard said, very truly, that the subject we are to discuss this morning was one that has a large spiritual element as well as a material element; for the principles are founded on things partly of the spirit and partly material. And it is a good thing for us to be reminded of that, because in our profession we do not live for bread alone. We live, not only for the service we render clients, but for the service we render to the business public and to the public at large. It is in those responsibilities and with the cognizance of them that we are this morning going to deal with this subject of the Principles. The panel that you have before you is made up of a discussion leader, of a group of people who wrote papers and then some other members of the panel. The discussion leader is Mr. Van Essen of the Netherlands. My special colleagues sitting at the elevated table are the two Vice-Chairmen of this meeting who support me, Mr. Mody and Dr. Allet. Mr. Mody of India, Dr. Allet of Austria. Mr. Van Essen occupies the centre place on the platform and will be the discussion leader. Five of the panel members prepared papers. Those papers were distributed to the delegates and I was going to say I was sure—I better say that I hope—that all of you read them. However, the papers are in your hands, you will find them exceedingly interesting.
