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One of the possible positive outcomes of the global financial crisis and the insane running from pillar to post by regulators and governments is that key professional services may be re-defined - preferably legally, but certainly in the popular mind.

For, until we clean up the muck left behind in the Augean stables, there is a real risk that sometime in the future, may be years or even decades ahead, we will repeat the same mistakes.

For it is mind-boggling that almost the entire western banking sector, headed by some of the finest graduates from our best business schools, could have walked blinkered in to the toxic cesspit that is the sub-prime crisis.

Further, having got themselves up to their necks in the swill, these rather refined, highly financially skilled men - and they are usually men - then opted for the nuclear button and decided to pull down the entire temple of capitalism with them.

It is tempting to say this is a failure of the business school ethos and a victory for the on-the-job, top-down style of management, but I shall resist.

Even so, one professional group in the eye of the storm is that of auditing - not the internal number crunchers, but the real McCoy, external consultants.

The reason why governments must turn their eyes on auditors is quite clear: since the beginning of the 2000s, with the scandals of Enron, Worldcom et al, the one thing that has become obviously clear is that accountants and auditors should have been paying closer attention to the claims of chief financial officers, audit committees and internal auditors about the performance of some of the leading banks.

The theory is simple, at least in the UK. Auditors have an obligation on behalf of shareholders, even if this is surrounded with the mis-leading caveat that its statement of limited assurance is not a blanket endorsement of the financial statement.

Equally, their statements of 'reasonable assurance' do not inspire any confidence at all, since it is basically a halfway house between saying that a financial statement looks as if it is genuine and that there is something dodgy about the numbers. This is even more so when it comes to the claims of materiality.

Like the boy who disliked blame, audits in the UK are targeted at material fraud - but not all frauds as is the practice in the US, as those of us reading the daily behaviour of many of the leading global financial organisations know so well.

At an historic time like this, the words of comfort that we will all welcome from auditors are the very ones that they cannot give us, mainly because of the profession's own internal contradictions.

Auditing is generally done on the principle that the business is a going concern, a legal responsibility which is principally that of the directors.

However, if we were to take the mortgage industry as an example, the point will be made clearer. Unfortunately, we know that is a sector under a lot of pressure, or at least those lenders with a certain business model.

Yet, to read some of the auditors' reports you will get the impression these were water-tight and invincible enterprises.

What about the auditor's responsibility to assess risks to a business, critiquing management's assessment of the business, their relationship with bankers, payment dates, defaults, trading forecasts, and so on? This risk assessment is not a formality, it is real, now moreso than ever.

But at a time of great financial uncertainty reading the annual report and accounts of some of our leading retail and mortgage banks is like reading fairy tales of old. Although the overwhelming majority of company reports are informative and give an accurate record of the company's financial status, a minority hide their dubious activity behind a language of confusion and duplicity.

It is one clear case why the powerful department of business, enterprise and regulatory reform should give serious consideration to reforming the 2006 Companies Act to put right these omissions.

One reform that should be looked at immediately is putting the auditors' statements to the front of the reports with any qualifications, such as material uncertainties or significant doubts highlighted.

If, for example, a listed company's solvency is dependent on a lending facility with a funding bank and it expires on a due date and there is no alternative in place, for directors to then prepare the financial statement, then have it qualified by the auditors, on the principle of a going concern should be a criminal offence.

Another area of reform is to compel auditors to report all suspicions of fraud to the police, over and above any obligations under existing money laundering legislation.

These proposed changes are not to intimidate auditors, but to make it clear that auditors have a duty to the public which surpasses any duty of care they owe to shareholders, directors or even their own professional bodies.

Giving the concept of professional duty a legal definition will be one of the really positive outcomes of this awful period of change we are now going through, since at its very heart is the bonus culture which drives most senior executives' behaviour.

Any such reforms may even go further by giving the audit committee a legal responsibility for the management of the internal audit team, with Chinese walls between the team and the chief financial officer's office.

Call for changes in the way audits are carried out is not theoretical, since the financial health of funding bodies - banks, mutuals, supermarkets, and others - will determine access to credit for ordinary households.

Further, this global activity we are now experiencing will eventually impact on ordinary household wealth, and therefore the day-to-day work of the typical financial adviser.

Put simply, if the UK economy drifts in to a deep recession and government and the Bank of England fail in an attempt to kick-start the economy with interest cuts and robust fiscal measure, as a nation we will be facing a deep abyss. We will sink or swim together.

Hal Austin is editor of Financial Adviser