UKEB Board

UKEB Board

The UKEB comprises between 8–14  independent Board members. Members are appointed by the Chair, with a right of veto from the Secretary of State for BEIS following an open competition. Board membership represents a diversity of backgrounds and expertise.

Chair

Pauline Wallace was appointed as inaugural chair of the UKEB in September 2020.  

Pauline is a chartered accountant with over thirty years’ experience in accounting standards, including as a national standard setter in the UK and Hong Kong.  She subsequently became an accounting technical partner, initially with Arthur Andersen and subsequently with PricewaterhouseCoopers, where she established and led the global financial instruments team during the transition of EU listed companies to IFRS and through the global financial crisis.  She was PwC’s UK head of public policy and regulatory affairs until her retirement from the firm in 2013.

Pauline is currently a member of the Determinations Panel of the Pensions Regulator and previously served two terms as a member of the Regulatory Decisions Committee of the Financial Conduct Authority.

Pauline was a member of the UK Accounting Standards Board from 2010 to 2016 and a member of the ICAEW’s Regulatory Board from 2015 to 2019.

Corporates

Michael Ashley is a Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Audit Committee of Barclays PLC.  He is also a Non-Executive Director for the Cabinet Office and has held a number of public-sector roles and was previously a member of the UK Accounting Standards Board and the Technical Expert Group of the European Financial Advisory Group. 

Philip Aspin has over 25 years’ experience working for United Utilities Group, currently as Chief Financial Officer.  He was also previously a member of the Technical Expert Group of the European Financial Advisory Group.

Investors/Users

Paul Lee is an independent investment professional, and was most recently Head of Corporate Governance - Stewardship at Aberdeen Asset Management.  He is a senior adviser to the Investor Forum and a member of the Professionalism Steering Committee at the CFA Society of the UK.

Liz Murrall was Director of Stewardship and Reporting at the Investment Association, which represents UK institutional investors in companies, until her retirement at the end of 2020. She was also chair of the Financial Reporting Council’s Corporate Reporting Council until the recent governance reforms took effect, having been a member since 2013.

Accounting Firms

Giles Mullins is the UK Head of Financial Reporting Advisory Group & Special Projects, Grant Thornton UK LLP.

Sandra Thompson recently retired from her role as Partner, Global Accounting Consulting Services at PwC.  She has held roles at the IASB and the UK Accounting Standards Board.

Academics

Amir Amel-Zadeh is an Associate Professor at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford.  His research examining the role of information disclosure in capital markets has been published in leading academic and practitioner journals and cited by policy documents and the business press.

Michael Wells CA(SA) is Professor of Practice at Imperial College Business School and a World Bank consultant.  He led the International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB) IFRS Education Initiative for over a decade.

Others

Kathryn Cearns has been appointed to various public sector roles and has extensive senior level experience in both the public and private sectors.  Kathryn was Chair of the Financial Reporting Advisory Board to HM Treasury from 2010 to 2016 and was Chair of the ICAEW Financial Reporting Committee for 10 years up to the end of 2017.

Katherine Coates is a Partner and head of the Global Insurance Sector Group at Clifford Chance LLP with over 30 years' experience advising on a broad range of corporate, regulatory and commercial matters in the insurance and wider financial services sector in the UK and elsewhere.  Katherine has also chaired the audit and risk committee at Clifford Chance and been a member of the firm’s Partnership Council.