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Personality disorder was once a ‘diagnosis of exclusion’ and consequently many people, including offenders, were unable to access appropriate care. Some offenders therefore slipped through the net, with devastating consequences. However, recent developments in the health and criminal justice fields have sought to address this problem. One such initiative was the establishment in the Northwest of England of three specialist multi‐disciplinary Forensic Personality Disorder Assessment and Liaison Teams. Their task is to assess high‐risk offenders with personality disorder and provide a gate keeping and monitoring function to agencies involved in their care and management. This practice‐based paper outlines the work of the Greater Manchester team. It describes the team's approach to the assessment of these individuals and outlines some of the professional and ethical challenges encountered so far.

This paper explores the link between sexual offending and antisocial personality. Drawing on previous research, it illustrates that sex offenders with an antisocial personality are a heterogeneous group, differentiated by several factors. They victimise children, adults or both, those who victimise adults or adults and children are more psychopathic. They are motivated primarily by non‐sexual factors like opportunistic impulsivity or generalised anger, and violence is a source of erotic pleasure in some cases. A small group of men, however, are driven to offend by sadistic sexual fantasies of a serious nature, which develop over time and later form the basis of their violent predatory assaults. Varying definitions of antisocial personality confuse the research, and diagnostic co‐morbidity means that pure psychopathic types are probably rare.

Research suggests that prison‐based therapeutic communities (TCs) have a positive impact on inmates and recidivism. This study sought to establish the benefits of being in a prison‐based TC rather than a normal wing. A semi‐structured interview was conducted with an inmate on the TC at HMP Wymott in Lancashire and then analysed using thematic analysis.Eight themes emerged, suggesting that TCs are a better environment with better interpersonal relationships, have more help available, are safer, are more structured and hierarchical, have groups and group work, are more challenging, provide confrontational assistance and have various incentive schemes. Such factors brought real benefits to the research participant.Research on the efficacy of TCs is considered, as are the implications of this study's findings for the future of prison‐based TCs. Despite the positive findings, they should nonetheless be cautiously applied.

The successful management journey is replete with moments of truth. Recognizing those moments and their significance for successful managerial practice is both a reflective and a conscious practice. This article, written by a successful pharmacist who now manages a busy public service hospital pharmacy documents his management journey from starting position as a drug store pharmacist to his present position in the public service. The paper uses managerial process theory as a critical tool to assess the author's own managerial style. Starting off as an autocratic manager with micro management tendencies, he has now developed a different style of management built on a basic philosophy about the value of people. He sees a need for managers to build a work environment that supports the efforts of employees. This style has not only made him a more effective people manager and motivator, but he argues it has also made him a better pharmacist. The author concludes by advocating the value of reflective practice, particularly for healthcare administrators as a means of balancing the technical demands of their disciplines with the ongoing requirements of managing people.

The paper aims to explore the barriers that currently exist to patient‐driven treatment within the field of mental health care and reform.

This study represents action learning research using grounded theory to explore a possible causal basis for recidivism related to non‐compliance with medication. Interviews addressed concerns from the literature around perceived barriers to patient‐driven treatment evidenced by non‐compliance with medically recommended pharmaceutical treatment. Results were correlated to look for emergent themes that were used to form the basis for subsequent interview questions.

An analysis of the resulting emergent themes illustrated the importance of participatory treatment and coaching rather than medically applied paternalistic care, which is seen as encouraging learned helplessness on the part of patients. Similar helplessness was also revealed in clinicians themselves. Patients' awareness of their own needs and demands for more services place clients and the caregivers at odds over appropriate care in an environment of limited resources.

The research was limited to only a small number of interviewees in one institution, all of whom were closely associated with mental illness in various capacities. The grounded theory nature of the research does, however, provide a framework for more research in other institutions to test and further explore some of the findings.

The study demonstrated a reinforcement of Maslow's theory of needs hierarchy. The study illustrated a step‐wise approach to treatment to decrease the rate of failure and recidivism in mental health care. The provision of a stable living environment was viewed as instrumental in improving patients' compliance with pharmaceutical treatment. An action plan was therefore created to initiate the support of a transitional/emergency house by various community groups in partnership with pharmaceutical manufacturing companies.

Recidivism in mental health‐created by non‐compliance in pharmaceutical treatment, is a major issue in Canada's health care system. This study brings to the forefront issues from a number of perspectives in order to form a course of action in response to its findings.

The purpose of this study was to investigate how senior accounting staff in Victorian local authorities are recording and reporting infrastructure assets (IAs) with their relevant depreciation in General Purpose Financial Reports (GPFRs) and the decisions made from this information. IAs are long‐lived assets such as roads, drains and bridges. The introduction of Australian Accounting Standard No. 27 Financial Reporting by Local Governments (AAS27), which applies to all Australian local authorities require IAs to be reported in the balance sheet and depreciation to be charged in the operating statement in order to reflect the loss of service potential in the operating period concerned. Before AAS27, the purpose of public sector accounting was to demonstrate that funds have been raised and expended strictly within the authority of the annual budget on a cash basis. The efficiency and effectiveness of decision‐making by users of this cash‐based information was impaired with this short‐term charge/discharge objective. The study was carried out to determine if information provided in an accrual accounting environment would be more efficient and effective for decision making by users than cash‐based information.

The study included a comprehensive literature review then interviews with 15 chief financial officers from Victorian local authorities. These authorities represented inner metropolitan, outer metropolitan, rural city, large rural and small councils.

The study reported the implications for change to accrual accounting method in accounting for IAs and the efficiency and effectiveness for decision making by both internal and external users. The question answered is whether the information provided by accrual accounting is used in the management of IAs. In some areas, it has been used and the benefits show from both an efficiency and effectiveness perspective. Concerns with this issue were identified by academics, parliamentary inquires, accounting authorities and local government interest groups.

This study is a comprehensive review of how senior local government accounting management are using the information generated from AAS27 on IAs and what value it has in their decision making.

Governments in Australia are in the process of implementing accrual reporting for their departments and governments as a whole. The central issue of this paper is to provide an explanation as to how general purpose financial reporting became a significant issue for governments in Australia. Agenda‐setting literature provides the framework within which to analyse the specific events and strategies used by public sector accountants to promote accrual technologies. The main finding of the research is that accrual technologies have been promoted by public sector accountants working from within government institutions, and often aligned with the organised accounting profession. Prior to the late 1980s the Auditors‐General were the main actors involved, however, more recently, accounting technologies have been promoted by accounting policy units within Treasuries and Departments of Finance. The paper concludes with a call for future research on the implications of such accounting changes for organisational and social functioning.

This paper aims to present the findings of an investigation into environmental reporting practice in the airline sector.

Evidence was gathered from an international survey of 272 IATA Airlines. Responses accounted 65 per cent of the world's scheduled passenger traffic. Reports were assessed against a framework developed by UK's Association of Chartered and Certified Accountants.

The paper demonstrates that, despite an increase in the availability of quantitative data and some consistency in the use of key performance indicators, comparing social and environmental performance across the airline sector is fraught with difficulties. Variations in the exact definitions of the indicators used and the suite of functions embraced by the term “airline” are identified as fundamental obstacles to effective sector benchmarking.

Insight into an understanding of some of the pros and cons of comparisons between airline environmental performance data.

The research highlights the limitations of inter airline comparisons regarding environmental data and confirms the need for environmental and social impacts to be reported in a more standardised manner in order to facilitate meaningful dialogue with stakeholders in communities adjacent to airports.