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This paper describes the role and remit of the Scrutiny Unit, which assists members of parliament (MPs) with the analysis of accounting data.

The analysis is developed through an understanding of the secondary literature and practical experience of the work of the Unit.

The Scrutiny Unit is an unappreciated and yet vital part of the way in which financial scrutiny operates within the UK parliament. It translates to MPs key financial and economic documents including the budget and accounts. It is a unique institution, covering the entire financial cycle of approval and accountability within parliament.

This is the first descriptive piece on the Unit in an accounting journal and contributes to our understanding of how financial accountability works within the UK parliament.

The study explains why Parliamentarians in the United Kingdom (UK) focused on accountability through data during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as on how data could be used to improve the government’s response to the pandemic.

Understanding the implications of accountability for COVID-19 is crucial to understanding how governments should respond to future pandemics. This article provides an account of what a select committee in the UK thought were the essential elements of these accountability relationships. To do so, the authors use a neo-Roman concept of liberty to show how Parliamentary oversight of the pandemic for accountability was crucial to maintaining the liberty of citizens during the crisis and to identify what lessons need to be learnt for future crises.

The study shows that Parliamentarians were concerned that the UK government was not meeting its obligations to report openly about the COVID-19 pandemic to them. It shows that the government did make progress in reporting during the pandemic but further advancements need to be made in future for restrictions to be compatible with the protection of liberty.

The study extends the concept of neo-Roman liberty showing how it is relevant in an emergency situation and provides an account of why accountability is necessary for the preservation of liberty when the government uses emergency powers.

Governments and Parliaments need to think about how they preserve liberty during crises through enhanced accountability mechanisms and the publication of data.

The study extends previous work on liberty and calculation, providing a theorisation of the role of numbers in the protection of liberty.

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 chapter summarises the analysis of the preceding chapters. Whilst different countries use different models for their audit, some continuities do emerge. The audit explosion has led to the advance of both financial and performance audits. Inspection however remains an infrequent feature of the audit landscape. Many countries have a localised system of local audit in which the role and influence of audit is variable. Furthermore, the audit of local government lacks a clear democratic role at the moment.

Public sector audit has grown in importance since the 1980s across the world. In this chapter, the authors outline the state of the current debate about public sector audit – including the role of the auditor, the purpose of audit, developments in the content of audit and the function of audit. The authors argue that these can be conceptualised through the literature of regulatory space. Drawing on the work of Ferry and Ahrens (2021), the authors set out categories which can be used to compare the ways in which different systems of local government audit can be compared and provide the justification for the intellectual approach taken by the rest of the volume.

English local government audit has gone through fundamental change in the last decade and this period of instability looks certain to continue. Since 2014, councils have been audited by private sector auditors appointed theoretically by the councils themselves (though an overwhelming majority of councils have delegated this responsibility). The scope of audit after 2014 reduced to focus mainly on top-down financial management, rather than value for money or inspection. After growing concerns about the scope and quality of audit however, in 2020, the government commissioned Sir Tony Redmond to review local audit arrangements in England. The Redmond review identified several problems with the reformed structure and made recommendations for change. Currently, the sector is uncertain about what changes will be adopted to solve the issues discovered by Redmond.

This paper attempts to examine the relationship between consumer innovativeness and consumers' acceptance of brand extensions.

This is a conceptual paper that builds upon the extant literature of consumer innovativeness and brand extensions. A number of research propositions are developed in this thought‐provoking work.

It is proposed that consumer innovativeness exerts considerable influence on consumers' acceptance of brand extensions when extension distance and types of extensions are examined. In addition, product information availability and interpersonal communication/influence (i.e. informative and normative) moderate the relationship between consumer innovativeness and consumers' acceptance of brand extensions.

This study can help marketers develop appropriate and effective marketing strategies to influence consumers' acceptance of brand extensions. This study serves to provide guidance for brand managers and marketers alike in evaluating the potential success of their extended brands. On the other hand, the paper draws from the extant literature and theoretical discussion to develop research propositions. This approach might limit its depth and scope.

As the use of brand extensions intensifies in the marketplace, it is imperative to understand how consumer innovativeness exerts influence on acceptance of brand extensions. This study fills the research void in the literature and contributes to the extant literature by analyzing the relationship between consumer innovativeness and consumers' acceptance of brand extensions.

This study aims to examine the effect of market orientation on foreign knowledge acquisition. It also assesses the moderating role of absorptive capacity in the relationship between foreign knowledge acquisition, firm innovativeness and performance.

A questionnaire was administered to 257 respondents who were owners, managers or owner/managers of export firms in Ghana. The data were analyzed with structural equation modeling.

The findings show that customer orientation significantly influenced foreign business knowledge acquisition but not performance, and that competitor orientation significantly influenced both foreign business knowledge acquisition and firm innovativeness. Absorptive capacity was found to play a significant role in linking foreign business knowledge to innovativeness.

The study adds to the literature on knowledge management in firms by identifying the moderating role of absorptive capacity in the relationship between foreign business knowledge acquisition, innovativeness and performance.

Pre‐adolescents (children between the ages of eight and 12) are becoming increasingly important in today's market segment, in terms of both absolute size and spending power. Although much research is available concerning adolescent consumer behaviour, very little is known about pre‐adolescent consumer behaviour. The purpose of this research was to examine the extent to which normative and informative conformity issues affect the purchase of apparel products by pre‐adolescents. Results from the 200 pre‐adolescents interviewed indicate that: —as pre‐adolescents age, social conformity influence increases; —both males and females are concerned that others like the clothing they purchase, and purchase clothing to look like peers; —they purchase clothing to conform with both social and organised groups; —they most often observe informational clothing behaviours from peers, athletes, entertainers and siblings. This study revealed that pre‐adolescents begin to use clothing to conform to peer groups as early as age eight, a finding never before reported.