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The purpose of this paper is to analyse the nature and comparability of budget balance (surplus/deficit) numbers headlined by the Australian Commonwealth Government and the governments of the six Australian States and the two Australian Territories. It does this in the context of the transition to Australian accounting standard AASB 1049 Whole of Government and General Government Sector Financial Reporting.

A case study research method is adopted, based on a content/documentary analysis of the headline budget balance numbers in the general government sector budget statements of each of the nine governments for the eight financial years from 2004-2005 to 2011-2012.

Findings indicate some variation in the measurement bases adopted and a number of departures from the measurement bases prescribed in the reporting frameworks, including AASB 1049. Findings also reveal that none of the nine governments have headlined a full accrual based budget balance number since the implementation of AASB 1049 in 2008.

While the study focuses on the Australian general government sector environment, it has significant implications in highlighting the ambiguity in the government budget balance numbers presented and the monitoring and information asymmetry problems that can arise. Research findings have wider relevance internationally in highlighting issues arising with the public sector adoption of accrual accounting.

The paper highlights the manner in which governments have been selective in the manner in which they present important budget aggregates. This has important practical and social implications, as the budget balance number is one of the most important measures used to evaluate a government’s fiscal management and responsibility.

The paper represents the first detailed examination of aspects of the effect of the transition to AASB 1049.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the future development of heritage reporting in Australia. Public sector reporting of heritage has been a long-standing issue, due to shortcomings in (sector-neutral) for-profit-based financial reporting standards. Australia’s sector-neutral approach does not meet public sector users’ information needs. The authors develop a heritage reporting model to balance community and other stakeholders’ interests and address prior critiques.

The paper reviews heritage reporting requirements in Anglo-Western Countries, and analyses commentaries and research publications. It evaluates the existing reporting requirements in the context of new public management (which focusses on information and efficiency) and new public governance (NPG) (focussing on balancing interests and quality).

The paper proposes an NPG-based heritage reporting model which includes indicators of performance on the five UNESCO (1972) dimensions and operational guidelines issued by UNESCO (2015). These are identification, presentation, protection, conservation and transmission. The proposed model is consistent with the notion of US SFFAS 29 (the standard for Federal entities). Not all heritage must be capitalised and hence attachment of monetary value, but detailed disclosures are necessary.

The authors expect the proposed heritage reporting model to better serve users of heritage information compared to the present Australian Accounting Standards Board 116: Property, Plant and Equipment.

The authors’ proposed model of heritage reporting attempts to answer Carnegie and Wolnizer’s (1995, 1999) six questions, addresses decades of concerns raised in previous literature and provides a new perspective to heritage reporting based on NPG that should better serve users’ needs.

The purpose of this paper is to approach, both theoretically and empirically, public sector reporting at European Union (EU) level. It contributes to the accounting harmonisation literature by revealing the actual status of governmental reporting at the national level.

The paper carried out an exploratory data analysis of the harmonisation of statistical, budgetary and financial reporting at the EU level. A mapping visualisation offers a comprehensive overview of the current state of connections between these reporting systems.

The results reveal the complexity of governments’ reporting systems homogeneity, although all stakeholders recognise the struggle for the principles of performance and transparency in the public sector. Thus, these are following the EU Commission’s study, which concludes that there is significant heterogeneity in the accounting and reporting practices applied transversely throughout all Member States.

The relevance of the study is comprehensive, from the economic environment to the practitioners, from the international regulatory bodies to the national ones, all can assess and quantify the significance of the past, present and future changes, considering their needs. The limitations of the research regard the documentation background because uniformly accessing some information presented by the EU Member States is relatively tricky. Future research might focus on the effects of these changes as they occur.

The study contributes to the scientific literature in the public sector through a comprehensive, well-supported and statistically grounded analysis performed at EU level, able to provide reliable results and to support valuable future recommendations towards harmonised reporting. Moreover, it supports and encourages all national and international efforts for improving the comparability of financial, budgetary and aggregated statistical reports.

This paper aims to examine the quality of relations within upper-level management in Greek public hospitals (GPHs), as well as to specify the extent to which these facilitate or hinder the forthcoming International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) adoption and implementation.

A survey was conducted on a sample of 143 upper-management professionals drawn from across the 125 GPHs. A multivariate structural equation model (SEM) is used to investigate the degree of interdependence of the level of convenience of implementation under the view of the leader-member exchange (LMX) scale.

The findings suggest that the established leader-member relations in the GPHs facilitate reforms. However, these relationships are of little benefit to IPSAS adoption and implementation mainly due to the low degrees of competence and commitment to IPSAS. The passive adoption of IPSAS is the most likely outcome.

The study recontextualizes the LMX model to public sector research. The findings have value to hospital leadership and to policymakers, as well as to researchers studying the difficulties of IPSAS adoption and implementation.

In 2000, Cañibano et al. published a literature review entitled “Accounting for Intangibles: A Literature Review”. This paper revisits the conclusions drawn in that paper. We also discuss the intervening developments in scholarly research, standard setting and practice over the past 20+ years to outline the future challenges for research into accounting for intangibles.

We conducted a literature review to identify past developments and link the findings to current accounting standard-setting developments to inform our view of the future.

Current intangibles accounting practices are conservative and unlikely to change. Accounting standard setters are more interested in how companies report and disclose the value of intangibles rather than changing how they are determined. Standard setters are also interested in accounting for new forms of digital assets and reporting economic, social, governance and sustainability issues and how these link to financial outcomes. The IFRS has released complementary sustainability accounting standards for disclosing value creation in response to the latter. Therefore, the topic of intangibles stretches beyond merely how intangibles create value but how they are also part of a firm’s overall risk and value creation profile.

There is much room academically, practically, and from a social perspective to influence the future of accounting for intangibles. Accounting standard setters and alternative standards, such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and European Union non-financial and sustainability reporting directives, are competing complementary initiatives.

Our results reveal a window of opportunity for accounting scholars to research and influence how intangibles and other non-financial and sustainability accounting will progress based on current developments.

This study analyzes the factors behind the decisions made by the largest listed Chilean companies that mandatorily adopted the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in 2009 to present comparative IFRS financial statements that year. The authors focus on the role of the expected impact of the change in the accounting standards on a company's financial position as a determinant of this decision.

The sample comprises 105 nonfinancial companies, of which 57 decided to present comparative IFRS financial statements (full adoption) and 48 did not (proforma adoption). Logistic regression is employed to model the decision of interest.

The decision for full adoption is positively associated with the company's expectation that the change in the accounting standards would improve its financial position, albeit only up to a certain threshold, as evidenced by their inverse U-shaped association.

IFRS adoption in Chile creates a unique scenario that allows us to contribute to the literature on the determinants of voluntary disclosure by focusing on a specific case in which the decision to disclose comparative financial statements is associated with mandatory IFRS adoption. The present study provides evidence that opportunistic behavior influences this decision.

In the context of the Australian Government’s attempts to impose budget austerity measures on publicly funded universities in its higher education sector, the purpose of this paper is to assess the sector’s financial health.

The multi-dimensional study is based on seven years of government financial data from all 39 publicly funded Australian universities, supplemented by information from universities’ annual reports. Using a financial health model that reflects vulnerability, viability and resilience, the authors examine sector data using a suite of metrics. The authors analyse differences between those universities in the Top 10 and Bottom 10 by revenue, as a window into the financial health of the sector at large.

While mostly financially viable, the sector shows signs of financial vulnerability, particularly in the areas of expense control and financial sustainability. Possibly in response to an uncertain funding environment, universities are managing long-term liquidity by growing reserves. Debt represents largely untapped potential for universities, while differences between the Top 10 and Bottom 10 universities were most evident in the area of revenue diversity, a strong predictor of financial viability.

Focussing on a specific set of financial metrics limits the scope of the study, but highlights further research possibilities. These include more detailed statistical analysis of data, financial case studies of individual universities and the implications of revenue diversification on academic standards.

The paper contributes to higher education literature, providing empirical evidence of universities’ finances. It highlights the importance of universities’ financial resilience in an uncertain funding environment.