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Monday 1 October sees the implementation of the majority of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (the Act). Parts of the Act came into operation in April 2007, namely the creation of a new criminal offence of wilful neglect or ill treatment, the provision of Independent Mental Capacity Advocates (IMCAs) in England, and the Code of Practice governing the Act.The months leading up to October have been an exceptionally busy time for the Public Guardianship Office (PGO). The new legislation creates a new Office of the Public Guardian (OPG), which will replace the existing PGO. But there is more to this change than a simple re‐arrangement of words, as shown in this article.

This paper aims to examine the investigation process employed by the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG). This process is used whenever an allegation of abuse is received against either an attorney acting under a registered lasting or enduring power of attorney or against a deputy appointed by the court of protection to make decisions on behalf of someone who lacks the capacity to make those decisions themselves.

Case studies are used to demonstrate both how the investigation process works in practice and how one works in partnership with other organisations to help safeguard vulnerable adults.

The OPG works in partnership with a range of other relevant organisations to protect vulnerable adults from financial abuse. It details the types of activities, the OPG investigating officer may undertake to examine allegations of abuse and the targets set to help ensure any allegations are investigated promptly and effectively.

The duties bestowed upon the public guardian under the Mental Capacity Act (MCA) 2005, together with a general growing awareness of financial abuse, have had a significant impact upon the work of the investigations team. The case studies included exemplify the kinds of outcomes in cases of abuse and also demonstrate how Attorneys are subject to the same investigative scrutiny as court appointed deputies.

Three decades ago, the National Audit Office (NAO) in the UK acquired the powers to evaluate the extent that the British Administration was managed with economy, efficiency and effectiveness. The NAO has since adopted a dual mission: to help Parliament hold government to account and to improve public service. This study aims to investigate value-for-money (VFM) auditors’ internalisation of a dual organisational identity: “obstructive” actions as representatives of a Supreme Audit Institution (SAI) and “enabling good practice”, induced by a will stated in the mission that the NAO authorities have adopted.

The organisational identity held and promoted by VFM auditors working at the NAO was explored in this research project. The authors specifically examined the understanding of those who claim to be serving both Parliament and organisations audited in their quest for performance improvement. The authors prompted the auditors to explain how they manage to reconcile these seemingly incompatible roles, namely, that of guardians and watchdogs who must publicly report gaps noted and that of assistants in government’s learning process. To this end, the authors conducted a field study at the NAO in September 2012 during which 21 auditors were interviewed individually and as part of two discussion groups.

The findings indicate that the auditors interviewed do not perceive a dichotomy in NAO’s double mission, which they believe to be congruent with their audience’s expectations. They draw meaning and usefulness from their role of monitoring the Administration if they believe they have contributed to improve public affairs management. In their view, the singular role of guardian no longer suffices. The authors conclude that VFM auditors’ recently acquired identity of “moderniser” reflects a self-efficacy expectation that prevents them from recognising the apparent paradox within their dual identity and that lets them fantasise about their real influence on the Administration.

Admittedly, the limited number of auditors interviewed and who took part in discussion groups is not conducive to generalisation of the conclusions to all auditors in the NAO or to other SAIs. However, although modest in number, the auditor respondents have accumulated many years of VFM audit practice and have contributed to the production of many reports. The respondents could therefore rightfully speak of their work as VFM auditors and as representatives of an institution such as the NAO.

This study contributes to the debates about the place and role of SAIs in the control environment of Administrations. By soliciting testimonials from the actors working within the NAO, the authors could thus question certain a priori assumptions held by stakeholders in the political and administrative world for whom auditors are mere “watchdogs” of Administrations, and nothing more.

The dual mission that the NAO has adopted (similar to many other SAIs) has been formally and publicly stated. It was therefore worth investigating how experienced auditors such as those interviewed had internalised this mission. The authors argue that this dual mission, perhaps inspired by the managerialist culture that has shaped changes to the British Administration (and many other occidental Administrations) since the early 1980s and that is seemingly encouraged by Government, twists the legislator’s intentions, which are to consider SAIs’ auditors as guardians and watchdogs of Administrations, not as agents of change and improvement.

The text of a lecture given by Alan Rusbridger, Editor of The Guardian, to mark the opening of the new facilities for the Department of Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, Preston. The theme of the lecture is public trust in what journalists write. Argues that, despite the public’s lack of trust in newspapers, they do in fact uncover many truths that business, industry and Government are attempting to conceal. Examples are provided from the energy industry, science and the environment, transport, Home Office and food safety. Describes the important role The Guardian’s Readers’ Editor has had in increasing public trust in the newspaper.

The paper takes up the challenge offered in the call for papers for this special issue to explore the notion of public relations as “ethical guardian”. The approach taken is to review some influential academic perspectives as well as practitioner perspectives that emerged throughout the 20th century. It is argued that the ethics and social responsibility have long been an intrinsic part of public relations self‐identity. The paper identifies a number of problems for the public relations occupation that arise from its historical legacy and considers the implications for professional status.

The Children Act 1989 revolutionised the way in which care proceedings were conducted. Gone were the rudimentary procedures of the old system, where parents and children had limited access to independent representation. Instead, the Act enabled the local authority, parents and children to be equally represented and for evidence to be presented in an open and accessible manner. The changes were widely welcomed and hailed as the most significant reform of children's law for decades. Drawing on academic, legal and policy literature, this article examines the changing nature and context for the representation of children and parents over the past two decades. While there have been developments that have strengthened the representation of children and parents, it is argued that more recent changes, including increased bureaucracy and the introduction of the Public Law Outline, may well have the effect of subverting the system introduced by the Children Act 1989 and of returning matters to the inadequate pre‐existing system.

The latest information from the magazine chemist is extremely valuable. He has dealt with milk‐adulteration and how it is done. His advice, if followed, might, however, speedily bring the manipulating dealer before a magistrate, since the learned writer's recipe is to take a milk having a specific gravity of 1030, and skim it until the gravity is raised to 1036; then add 20 per cent. of water, so that the gravity may be reduced to 1030, and the thing is done. The advice to serve as “fresh from the cow,” preferably in a well‐battered milk‐measure, might perhaps have been added to this analytical gem.

According to a report just issued by Dr. ARTHUR NEWSHOLME, the Principal Medical Officer of the Local Government Board, it appears that a majority of the staff of the Medical Department of the Board have been engaged in assisting to establish as favourable sanitary conditions as possible at the training centres for the new troops so that the risks associated with the concentration and feeding of large numbers of men under temporary conditions should be reduced to a minimum.

The study focusses on explaining why advocates for reform to state audit in the United Kingdom (UK) in the early 1980s, focussed on improving the links between the new National Audit Office (NAO) and Parliament, rather than on traditional notions of audit independence. The study shows how this focus on the auditor's link to Parliament depends on a particular concept of liberty and relates this to the wider literature on the place of audit in democratic society.

Understanding the issue of independence of audit in protecting the liberties and rights of citizens needs addressed. In this article, the authors investigate the creation of audit independence in the UK in the National Audit Act (1983). To do so, the authors employ a neo-Roman concept of liberty to historical archives ranging from the late 1960s to 1983.

The study shows that advocates for audit reform in the UK from the 1960s to the 1980s were arguing for an extension to Parliament's power to hold the executive to account and that their focus was influential on the way that the new NAO was established. Using a neo-Roman concept of liberty, the authors show that they believed Parliamentary surveillance of the executive was necessary to secure liberty within the UK.

The neo-Roman republican concept of liberty extends previous studies in considering the importance of audit for public accountability, the preservation of liberty and democracy.

Public sector audit can be a fundamentally democratic activity. Auditors should be alert to the constitutional importance of their work and see parliamentary accountability as a key objective.

The neo-Roman concept of liberty extends previous studies in considering the importance of audit for public accountability, preservation of liberty and democracy.

This study aims to examine the public budgeting process in the higher education and research sectors of Iran. It focuses on the actors’ budgetary roles and uses their perspectives to identify deficiencies in the budgeting process that cause delays in the transition to a performance-based system.

This study uses an interpretive research paradigm. It applies the grounded theory methodology to analyze the interviews conducted with those responsible for budgeting at Iranian public universities and research institutes (PURI). The results are interpreted using Wildavsky’s (1964) budgetary roles paradigm.

Using Wildavsky’s (1964) paradigm, “spenders” and “guardians” are identified and their perceptions about the public budgeting process are described. The results suggest a decoupling between the actors’ perceptions based on their budgetary roles. Spenders consider budgeting as a negotiation-based process, while guardians’ decisions are largely based on “outputs” and “information.” This study demonstrates that the disagreement over the perceived budget process was due to different budgetary roles. This disagreement leads to delays in the transformation of the budget process in Iranian PURI.

While efforts are made to obtain a sample of individuals with different roles and responsibilities, the selection is limited by subjects’ willingness and availability. Therefore, sample size and diversity are potential limitations of this study.

When organizations attempt to transition to performance-based budgeting (PBB), it is critical to understand the current budgeting process to identify potential impediments. Understanding these impediments allows for alternate approaches to be considered. This is particularly important for universities that are mostly funded by the government (such as those in Iran). The results of this study show that the contradictory perceptions among budget actors have a significant impact on budgeting transition and require attention to understand budgeting decisions.

This study contributes to the budgeting literature in three ways. First, it examines the impact of endogenized shared values among budget participants on the budgeting transition process. Second, by focusing on budgetary roles, it contributes to the literature by examining disagreement on the perceived budgeting process and its implications for transforming the process into PBB. Finally, to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine the public budgeting process in a developing country – Iran.