Issues in Accrual Accounting and Budgeting by Government

Abstract

he adoption of accrual accounting and budgeting systems has been central to the program of Commonwealth Public Sector reforms over the past 20 years. The reforms are explained in publications such as Department of Finance (DOF, 1994a,b), National Commission of Audit (1996); Guthrie and Parker (1998); and Wanna, Kelly and Forster (2000). They were heralded with much praise and promise for improvements in the efficiency of resource management and effectiveness in policy delivery, and in enhanced transparency of information and accountability to Parliament and the public. However, while major improvements have been made in these matters, significant concerns remain about the new systems and they have created many problems. The fundamental features of the new financial measurement systems and the problems they have created are reviewed in the paper. The problems arise from the scrapping of the former cash accounting and budgeting system (CABS) upon the introduction of accrual accounting, and secondly, from the simultaneous introduction of two distinctly different accrual accounting and budgeting systems (AABS)-the Australian Accounting Standards (AAS) system and the Government Finance Statistics (GFS) system. It is contended that: • a CAB system should be reintroduced because it provided necessary information for the management of government fiscal policies and cash; • only one AAB system should be used; • the GFS system, as upgraded, should be the one adopted as it provides the information required by governments, and the AAS system should be discontinued as it has limited relevance to the environment of governments; • the CAB system should be designed as an integral component of the AAB system. This paper begins by briefly examining the role of accounting as a financial management information and reporting system in government, and the nature and roles of government so as to establish its financial information needs. I then examine the nature of each of the three accounting systems and the types of information provided by each, followed by my conclusions and recommendations. The paper is confined to the activities of the general government sector of the Commonwealth Government and to the information published in regular Allan Barton is Emeritus Professor in the School of Business and Information Management, The Australian National University.