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| Wilson Hosts Corporate Accountability Roundtable |
August 19, 2002 |
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| Albuquerque, NM--Congresswoman Heather Wilson highlighted the importance of maintaining honesty and integrity in the American free market system at a Corporate Accountability Roundtable held today at TVI. Members of the group included business leaders, individual investors, accountants, and employees of publicly traded companies. In her remarks, Wilson explained the Corporate Responsibility Bill recently passed by Congress and signed by the President.
“We`ve had some companies led by greedy people who cooked the books aided by accountants who dishonored their profession. That`s fraud and some people should go to jail for it,” said Wilson. “They tried to work around the system, so we have tightened some of the rules of the system to make sure this can`t happen again. The question is, what else needs to be done to protect investors, restore confidence, and create jobs?”
The Corporate and Auditing Accountability, Responsibility, and Transparency Act includes the following provisions:
Increases criminal penalties for a broad array of white-collar crimes (including 20 years for document shredding and obstruction of justice), freezes extraordinary payments to employees of companies under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission and makes it a crime to retaliate against corporate whistleblowers;
Creates a Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to enforce auditing, quality control, and independence standards and rules. Fees charged to all publicly traded companies will fund the board;
Enhances corporate disclosure, including immediate disclosure of any information affecting the material health of the company;
Ensures investors who have lost money in the markets as a result of corporate malfeasance receive compensation from any legal settlement.
Wilson also urged the Senate to pass the pension reform bills the House of Representatives has passed, so that America’s seniors can have a secure retirement. These bills would allow employees easier access to the information they need to make personal financial decisions and allow employees to diversify their pensions out of corporate stock. The bills also strengthen oversight of corporate auditing and require real-time disclosure of information important to investors.
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