外文文献翻译译文
原文：
PERFORMANCE AUDIT OF AUSTRALIAN PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS:LEGITIMISING GOVERNMENT POLICIES OR
PROVIDING INDEPENDENT OVERSIGHT?
Performance auditing developed from the need to provide assurance of the achievement of the administrative objectives of New Public Management(NPM) in the public sector:economy,efficiency,effectiveness and‘good management’ of government programs(Pollitt et al.,1999).According to Pollitt et al.(1999,p.9),auditing for effectiveness and good management‘demands an investigation of outcomes,which by definition,take place in the world beyond the organisation or program’,and requires the use of independent evaluation criteria.However,the auditing of effectiveness and good management have been controversial because of disputed understandings of what these terms mean in particular settings,and differences of opinion regarding evidence of their achievement (Cutt,1977;Hamburger,1989;and Guthrie and Parker,1999).NPM’s focus on‘performance’has also given rise to debates about where to draw the line between auditing the implementation of program objectives and auditing the effectiveness of program objectives and associated implementation strategies,which are beyond the mandate of auditors-general(Pollitt et al.,1999).
Public private partnerships(PPPs)are time and cost-specific agreements between the state and a private consortium for infrastructure-based service provision. The consortium undertakes responsibility for financing,designing and constructing(or refurbishing)a facility,and for providing services. The government(or service users)provide the consortium with a revenue stream that is used to repay debt,fund operations and provide a return to investors. The risks associated with financing and building the infrastructure and with service delivery are transferred to the consortium. The anticipated risk transfer justifies the use of costly private finance. It also enables value for money(VFM)savings through reduced whole of life project costs. This
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means risk transfer and VFM are the primary motivations for these projects and make these partnership arrangements economically viable for governments.
Little is known about the extent or characteristics of PPP audits in Australia. This paper aims to fill this gap by investigating audit incidence. The paper has three objectives.
First,it seeks to examine performance audits of Australian Public private partnerships and determine their scope and focus against an auditing framework criteria devised from mandated procedures outlined in Public private partnerships steering mechanisms. Second,the paper aims to determine whether Australian PPP audits can be classified as substantive or as systems-based.Third,the paper examines whether there is a link between audit classification,auditors-general and controversy surrounding audit/audited PPP projects. The next section provides an overview of the context in which PPPs have been developed and implemented in Australia. The third section reviews the prior literature on performance audits and the fourth section reports on research methods used in analysing audit reports to determine the extent to which insights from performance audit and PPP literature explain observed characteristics. The fifth section presents results and analysis.The final section provides concluding comments.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT OVERSIGHT OF PPPs:INSIGHTS FROM THE
LITERATURE
In performance audits,audit criteria are the benchmarks against which the activities of audited bodies are compared,and upon which audit conclusions and recommendations rely. These criteria are a largely uncodified set of standards about what constitutes‘good practice’ .Consequently,the criteria,and their use in performance audit,are crucial to its perceived ability to provide independent oversight of the effectiveness and management of program implementation.
Confirming findings in Australia and international literature，longitudinal study into performance audit practice found evidence of a fundamental link betweenNPM( New Public Management) implementation and changing performance
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audit practice. Although there is general agreement about the origins and distinctive characteristics of New Public Management and performance audits, their development and outworking are intertwined, contested,context-dependent and change over time. Performance audit practice both influences,and is influenced by, New Public Management implementation.
PERFORMANCE AUDIT OF AUSTRALIAN PUBLIC PRIVATE
PARTNERSHIPS 319
Like NPM,performance audits are concerned with‘effectiveness’and‘good management’and raise questions about the use of‘best practice’performance accountability frameworks as audit criteria(Pollitt et al.,1999;Gendron et al.,2001;Broadbent and Laughlin,2003;and Skrbk,2006).Some auditors- general are actively engaged in developing these frameworks,and also appear to use them as audit criteria(often as a consequence of a desire to foster‘modernisation’in the public sector(Skrbk,2006)).However,these activities also appear to legitimise government policy and have been criticised aspotentially compromising the ability of auditors-general to provide independentand effective oversight of the implementation of those policies(Gendron et al.,2001;Broadbent ).
The Australian performance audit literature finds that individual auditors-general have adopted strikingly different interpretations of what performance audits are and how they should be conducted,resulting in observable differences in their conduct. Early Australian studies conclude that investigated performance audits tend to concentrate on economy and efficiency as opposed to effectiveness(Hatherly and Parker,1988),confirming that auditing for effectiveness is a contentious and technical. in summary,the literature suggests that PPP performance audits most frequently investigate systems-based adherence to steering mechanisms,rather than the substantive effectiveness of steering mechanism implementation in achieving stated.
This research is based on a historically-informed documentary study of PPP steering mechanisms and performance audit reports(identified by Gendronet al.,2001,as a‘window’through which researchers can understand how auditors-general socially construct performance auditing at particular points in time).The first PPP
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performance audit report was published in 1994 and the most recent in May 2006.Initially,all reports were read independently by two researchers to identify the presence(or absence)of reference to the eleven items that constitute the PPP performance audit framework.A small number of categorisation differences were settled consultatively.A code was allocated toeach report to facilitate discussion of results.
By contrast,substantive audits investigate the effectiveness of policy imple- mentation in relation to core activities and the quality of service experienced by users against externally-derived criteria(Pollitt et al.,1999).They involve a degree of scepticism and some understanding of human nature and a willingness to independently recalculate benchmarks.They include some systems-based elements to provide low-level assurance about adherence to internally-mandated steering mechanisms.However,substantive audits move beyond checking the effectiveness of adherence to internal control systems or audit-mandated performance frameworks.They disclose the ramifications of poorly implemented procedures supported by quantitative and qualitative explanations and examples, providing a richer understanding of reasons for performance failure,and the basis for conclusions and recommendations.Also,they may challenge the boundary between investigating the effectiveness of policies per se and the effectiveness of policy implementation(Guthrie,1989;Hamburger,1989;and Pollitt et al.,1999),explaining the political sensitivity of performance audits.Substantive audits are costly both politically and in terms of time and labour(forexample,they frequently involve the use of consultants)(Pollitt et al.,1999).Pollitt et al.’s(1999)study found that most reviewed performance audits were systems-based.The exception was UK performance audits from 1993 to 1995,6which were categorised as substantive.However,Gendron et al.(2001),previous Australian studies and PFI literature challenge these findings.
UK literature argues that the substantive issue for performance audits in a PFI context is providing assurance about the achievement of anticipated risk transfer and VFM.This is accomplished by investigating whether the spending of public
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money(in the PFI operating stage)is in accordance with contractual agreements (Edwards et al.,2004;and Pollock and Price,2004);or concluding that no changes in contracted payment streams to government have occurred.Broadbent et al. (2004)call for PFI performance audits to broaden their investigation of VFM achievement to include a broad range of ex post non-financial outcomes at the government,agency and project levels.
REFLECTION AND CONCLUSION
The objective of this research was to understand the extent,focus an characteristics of Australian performance audit of PPPs. It provides evidence that only a few performance audits of these complex,long term and controversial arrangements have taken place in Australia,and that auditing has mostly concentrated on investigating the pre-contracting stage. Nevertheless,auditors-general have provided welcome disclosures about aspects of these arrangements that would otherwise have remained hidden from parliaments and the public.
Only two Australian auditors-general have investigated the achievemen anticipated risk transfer and VFM in the operating stage.Both audit pre-2000 PPPs that includethe delivery of core services by consortia.PA9 analyses the financial and non-financial ramifications of unabated payments for substandard service delivery and of poorly constructe quantitative performance indicators in private prison contracts.PA8 also focuses on payments and performance in a privately owned and operated hospital.
This research indicates that the auditors-general whose reports were classified as substantive were also more likely to question government policy and/or implementation strategies as well as consider the audited transactions within a wider public-sector policy context.
It seems that Australia’s parliaments are now providing more substantive dependent external review of PPP projects than auditors-general.VPAEC 006),instance,examined
PPP
governance
arrangements;risk
allocationsnd
transfers;economic benefits;their accountability and public interest mifications;and the impact of changes iinternational accounting standards.xaminations undertaken by
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澳大利亚公私伙伴关系的绩效审计：使政府的政策合法化或提供独立的监督？【外文翻译】
