Glossary

Term	Meaning
Aboriginal Councils and Associations Act 1976 (ACA Act)	An Act to provide for the Constitution of Aboriginal Councils and the Incorporation of Associations of Aboriginals and for matters connected therewith. Superseded by the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006.
Aboriginal Land Grant (Jervis Bay Territory) Act 1986	An Act providing for the establishment of the Wreck Bay Aboriginal Community Council and the granting of land to Aboriginal people in the Jervis Bay Territory. It also sets out the legal regime for dealings with the land.
Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 (the ALRA)	An Act providing for the granting of Traditional Aboriginal Land in the Northern Territory for the benefit of Aboriginals, the establishment of land councils to represent Aboriginal interests and the setting up of the Aboriginals Benefit Account (ABA). It is the most significant land rights legislation in Australia, resulting in the transfer of almost half of the territory’s land to Aboriginal ownership under inalienable freehold title.
Accrual accounting	System of accounting where items are brought to account and included in the financial statements as they are earned or incurred, rather than as they are received or paid.
Accumulated depreciation	The aggregate depreciation recorded for a particular depreciating asset.
Additional Estimates	Where amounts appropriated at Budget time are insufficient, Parliament may appropriate more funds to portfolios through the Additional Estimates Acts.
Administered items	Expenses, revenues, assets or liabilities managed by agencies on behalf of the Commonwealth. Agencies do not control administered items. Administered expenses include grants, subsidies and benefits. In many cases, administered expenses fund the delivery of third party outputs.
Administrative Arrangements Order	An Administrative Arrangements Order is issued by the Governor-General that provides for the arrangements of government administration, including the matters that are dealt with by each department and the legislation administered by each Minister.
Annual Appropriation	Acts of Parliament, which provide appropriation for the Government’s activities during a specific financial year. Three Appropriation Bills are introduced into Parliament in May and comprise the Budget. Further supplementary Bills are introduced later in the financial year as part of the Additional Estimates process. The Parliamentary Departments have their own Appropriation Bills.
Appropriation	An authorisation by Parliament to spend moneys from the Consolidated Revenue Fund for a particular purpose.
Appropriations Act	Act for the appropriation of money from the Consolidated Revenue Fund for certain expenditure, and for related purposes.
Assets	Future economic benefits controlled by an entity as a result of past transactions or other past events.
Budget measure	A finalised decision by the Cabinet that has a financial impact in the Budget or forward years.
Carrying value	The value of an asset or according to its balance sheet account balance. For assets, the value is based on the original cost of the asset less any depreciation, amortization or impairment costs made against the asset.
Category ‘B’ findings	Findings that pose a moderate business or financial risk, or financial reporting risk.
Category ‘C’ findings	Findings that are procedural in nature, or reflect relatively minor administrative shortcomings.
Consolidated Revenue Fund	Section 81 of the Constitution stipulates that all revenue raised or money received by the Commonwealth forms the one Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF). The CRF is not a bank account. The Official Public Account reflects most of the operations of the CRF.
Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006 (CATSI Act)	An Act providing for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations, and for related purposes. Delivers modern corporate governance standards to some 2500 Indigenous corporations.
Departmental items	Assets, liabilities, revenues and expenses that are controlled by the agency to produce outputs. Departmental items would generally include computers, plant and equipment assets used by agencies in providing goods and services and most employee expenses, supplier costs and other administrative expenses incurred.
Depreciation	Apportionment of an asset’s capital value as an expense over its estimated useful life to take account of normal usage, obsolescence, or the passage of time.
Disability Discrimination Act 1992	An Act that protects people with disability from discriminatory treatment in a wide range of areas. It requires that people with disability be given equal opportunity to participate in the full range of economic, social, cultural and political activities that occur across society.
Discretionary grants	Discretionary grants are payments where the Portfolio Minister or paying agency has discretion in determining whether or not a particular applicant receives funding and may or may not impose conditions in return for the grant.
Effectiveness indicators	Indicators to assess the degree of success in achieving outcomes. As outcomes are generally long-term in nature, effectiveness indicators often relate to intermediate outcomes (shorter-term impacts) below the planned outcomes specified.
Efficiency indicators	Measures the adequacy of an agency’s management of its outputs (and where applicable, administered items). Includes price, quality and quantity indicators. The interrelationship between the three efficiency indicators of any one output should be considered when judging efficiency.
Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (the EPBC Act)	The Act is the Government’s central piece of environmental legislation. It provides a legal framework to protect and manage nationally and internationally important flora, fauna, ecological communities and heritage places—defined in the Act as matters of national environmental significance.
Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999	An Act to require certain employers to promote equal opportunity for women in employment, to establish the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency and the Office of the Director of Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace, and for related purposes.
Equity or net assets	Residual interest in the assets of an entity after deduction of its liabilities.
Estimates	Estimates are an agency’s expected revenues, expenses, assets, liabilities and cash flows. They are prepared for each output in the Budget, in consultation with the Department of Finance and Deregulation (see also Forward Estimates and Additional Estimates).
Ex-gratia/ Act of Grace payment	A benevolent payment made to anyone in the public interest for a loss or incurred expenditure for which the Commonwealth has no legal or financial responsibility or liability. Payments are available (but not guaranteed) only when no other statutory, regulatory or policy avenues exist for the granting of financial relief.
Expenses	Expenses represent the full costs of an activity, that is, the total value of all the resources consumed in producing goods and services or the loss of future economic benefits in the form of reductions in assets or increases in liabilities of the entity. Expenses include cash items such as salary payments, as well as expenses that have been incurred, such as accruing employee entitlements that will be paid in the future.
Fair value	Valuation methodology: The amount for which an asset could be exchanged or a liability settled between knowledgeable, willing parties in an arm’s length transaction. Australian Government entities will move to this method incrementally by 30 June 2006, for valuing most infrastructure, plant and equipment.
Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Northern Territory National Emergency Response and other Measures) Act 2007	An Act to amend laws in order to respond to the Northern Territory’s national emergency, including laws in relation to prohibited material, law enforcement, infrastructure, and access to Aboriginal land.
Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997 (FMA Act)	An Act to provide for the proper use and management of public money, public property and other Commonwealth resources, and for related purposes.
Forward Estimates	The financial statement estimate for the three outyears after the budget year.
Freedom of Information Act 1982	An Act to give members of the public rights of access to official documents of the Australian Government and of its agencies.
Grants	Non-reciprocal transfers of economic resources, where the payer agency does not receive approximately equal value in return.
Green Paper	A preliminary government report of a proposal intended to stimulate debate and launch a process of consultation on a particular subject.
Income Tax (Mining Withholding Tax) Act 1979	An Act to impose income tax upon certain payments made in connection with the use of Aboriginal land.
Machinery of government changes	Machinery of government changes are a variety of organisational or functional changes to the distribution of responsibilities amongst the agencies and departments of the Australian Government. The changes can result from a new Administrative Arrangements Order (see Administrative Arrangements Order), the creation or abolition of a statutory agency or the movement of functions in or out of the APS.
Northern Territory (Self-Government) Act 1978	The Act established the Northern Territory as a body politic under the Crown, with the provision of an Administrator and an Executive Council for the Territory. The Act gives the Territory limited state-like powers.
Occupational Health and Safety Act 1991 (the OHS Act)	The Act establishes a framework for the regulation of employers, employees and practices at workplaces covered by the OHS Act to protect the health and safety of employees at work.
Departmental outcomes	The Government’s objectives for the FaHCSIA portfolio. Outcomes are desired results, impacts or consequences for the Australian community as influenced by the actions of the Australian Government. Actual outcomes are assessments of the end-results or impacts actually achieved.
Output groups	A logical aggregation of agency outputs, where useful, and based either on homogeneity, type of product, business line or beneficiary target group. Aggregation of outputs may also be needed for the provision of adequate information for performance monitoring, or based on a materiality test.
Performance information	Evidence about performance that is collected and used systematically. Evidence may relate to appropriateness, effectiveness and efficiency. It may be about outcomes, factors that affect outcomes, and what can be done to improve them.
Portfolio Additional Estimates	The changes in funding requirements that occur after the presentation of the Budget. These changes to funding require the consideration of Additional Estimates by the House of Representatives and the Senate.
Price	One of the three key efficiency indicators. The amount the Government or the community pays for the delivery of agreed outputs.
Privacy Act 1988	The Act is the principal piece of legislation providing protection of personal information in the federal public and private sector.
Public Service Act 1999	An Act to provide for the establishment and management of the Australian Public Service, and for other purposes.
Quality	One of the three key efficiency indicators. Relates to the characteristics by which customers or stakeholders judge an organisation, product or service. Assessment of quality involves the use of information gathered from interested parties to identify any differences between the expectations and experiences of the customers and stakeholders.
Quantity	One of the three key efficiency indicators. Quantity indicators may measure: the size of an output; count or volume; how many or how much.
Reasonable adjustment	The administrative, environmental, or procedural alterations required to enable a person with disability to work effectively and enjoy equal opportunity with others. By law, employers are required to provide reasonable adjustments whenever it is necessary, reasonable, and possible to do so (i.e., when a reasonable adjustment does not constitute an unjustifiable hardship for the employer).
Receipts	The total or gross amount received by the Commonwealth. Each receipt item is either revenue, an offset within outlays, or financing transactions. Receipts include taxes, interest, charges for goods and services, borrowings and Government Business Enterprise dividends received.
Revenue	Total value of resources earned or received to cover the production of goods and services.
Social Security (Administration) Act 1999	Provisions in the Social Security Act 1991 concerning the administration of social security payments were split into this separate Act.
Social Security Act 1991	An Act to provide for the payment of certain pensions, benefits and allowances to eligible Australian’s, and for related purposes.
Special Account	Balances existing within the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) that are supported by standing appropriations (Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997 (FMA Act) ss.20 and 21). Special accounts allow money in the CRF to be acknowledged as set-aside (hypothecated) for a particular purpose. Amounts credited to a Special Account may only be spent for the purposes of the Special Account. Special Accounts can only be established by a written determination of the Finance Minister (s.20 FMA Act) or through an Act of Parliament (referred to in s.21 of the FMA Act).
Special Appropriations (including Standing Appropriations)	An amount of money appropriated by a particular Act of Parliament for a specific purpose and number of years. For special appropriations the authority to withdraw funds from the Consolidated Revenue Fund does not generally cease at the end of the financial year. Standing appropriations are a sub‑category consisting of ongoing special appropriations—the amount appropriated will depend on circumstances specified in the legislation.
Specific Purpose Payments (SPPs)	Commonwealth payments to the states are divided into General Purpose Payments and Specific Purpose Payments (SPPs). The term payments is used because the amounts referred to are gross transfers, not net, which would include repayments of advances to the state and territory governments. Most SPPs are conditional on policy objectives set by the Commonwealth or the achievement of national policy objectives agreed between the Commonwealth and state and territory governments.
Statutory authority	A government agency set up by an Act of Parliament, more or less independent of day-to-day ministerial control, usually not bound by public service procedures to the same extent as ordinary departments, and which is responsible finally to Parliament.
Tax Assessment Act 1936	An Act to consolidate and amend the law relating to the imposition, assessment and collection of a tax upon incomes.
Taxation Laws Amendment Act (No. 3) 1994	An Act to amend the law relating to taxation.
Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Amendment Act 2006 (Amendment Act)	An Act to amend the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976, and for other purposes.
Welcome to Country	A ceremony that allows the Traditional Owners of the region to give their blessing for the event to take place on their land. It is performed by a representative of the custodians of the land where the event is taking place.
White Paper	A parliamentary paper enunciating government policy and often explaining the results or conclusions of research. Follows a Green Paper (see Green Paper).

Return to top

Contents

Glossary