"Correspondence with the facts"- a recurrent theme in commentaries on the statutory quality standard of truth and fairness in accounts

A recent NCSC consultative paper has recommended that both the words "true" and "fair" be retained in the companies legislation to depict the statutory quality standard for corporate accounts. The paper argued that the statutory test of quality in accounts should be serviceability for financial action in markets, not merely compliance with professional accounting standards and conventions. To be serviceable for market action, accounts must correspond with the actual financial features of firms at the dates specified in them. This paper demonstrates that the necessity for accounts to have this character has been a recurrent theme in statutes, legal cases and the accounting literature in the U.S.A., U.K. and Australia.