Cash to accruals accounting in British central government: a journey through time

Edwards, John Richard ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1526-8523 2023. Cash to accruals accounting in British central government: a journey through time. Financial Accountability and Management 39 (1) , pp. 40-59. 10.1111/faam.12295

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Abstract

Departmental and central government accountability to the UK Parliament was based principally on cash transactions for a period of over 300 years commencing with the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Beginning in the second decade of the nineteenth century, recurrent proposals for the replacement of cash accounting by accruals accounting were founded on the conviction that “commercial” accounting practices provided a more effective basis for performance measurement, financial control and public accountability. This paper studies the progress of these initiatives through time, with Treasury resistance to the adoption of private sector-type accounting practices by administrative departments recognized as a persistent and effective barrier to innovation up until the 1980s.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HF Commerce H Social Sciences > HF Commerce > HF5601 Accounting
Additional Information:	This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.
Publisher:	Wiley
ISSN:	0267-4424
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	4 May 2021
Date of Acceptance:	27 April 2021
Last Modified:	14 May 2023 14:00
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/140918

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