Saxophone Enterprises Co （Saxophone) has been trading for 15 years selling insurance and h

Saxophone Enterprises Co (Saxophone) has been trading for 15 years selling insurance and has recently become a listed company. In accordance with corporate governance principles Saxophone maintains a small internal audit department. The directors feel that the team needs to increase in size and specialist skills are required, but they are unsure whether to recruit more internal auditors, or to outsource the whole function to their external auditors, Cello & Co.

Saxophone is required to comply with corporate governance principles in order to maintain its listed status; hence the finance director has undertaken a review of whether or not the company complies.

Bill Bassoon is the chairman of Saxophone, until last year he was the chief executive. Bill is unsure if Saxophone needs more non-executive directors as there are currently three non-executive directors out of the eight board members. He is considering appointing one of his close friends, who is a retired chief executive of a manufacturing company, as a non-executive director.

The finance director, Jessie Oboe, decides on the amount of remuneration each director is paid. Currently all remuneration is in the form. of an annual bonus based on profits. Jessie is considering setting up an audit committee, but has not undertaken this task yet as she is very busy. A new sales director was appointed nine months ago. He has yet to undertake his board training as this is normally provided by the chief executive and this role is currently vacant.

There are a large number of shareholders and therefore the directors believe that it is impractical and too costly to hold an annual general meeting of shareholders. Instead, the board has suggested sending out the financial statements and any voting resolutions by email; shareholders can then vote on the resolutions via email.

Required:

(a) Explain the advantages and disadvantages for each of Saxophone Enterprises Co AND Cello & Co of outsourcing the internal audit department.

Note: The total marks will be split as follows:

Saxophone Enterprises Co (8 marks)

Cello & Co (2 marks) (10 marks)

(b) In respect of the corporate governance of Saxophone Enterprises Co:

(i) Identify and explain FIVE corporate governance weaknesses; and

(ii) Provide a recommendation to address each weakness.

Note: The total marks will be split equally between each part. (10 marks)