Financial Year (financial + year)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


The size and mix of government spending on illicit drug policy in Australia

DRUG AND ALCOHOL REVIEW, Issue 4 2008
TIMOTHY J. MOORE
Abstract Aim. To estimate how much governments in Australia spend on reducing and dealing with illicit drug problems. Methods. Government documents and supplementary information sources were used to estimate drug-related expenditure for the financial year 2002,03, in Australian dollars. Public sector expenditure on reducing drug problems (,proactive expenditure') was classified into four policy functions: prevention, treatment, harm reduction and enforcement. Expenditure related to the consequences of drug use (,reactive expenditure') was included as a separate category. Results. Spending by Australian governments in financial year 2002,03 on all drug-related activities was estimated to be $3.2 billion. Proactive expenditure was estimated to be $1.3 billion, comprising 55% on enforcement, 23% on prevention, 17% on treatment, 3% on harm reduction and 1% on activities that span several of these functions. Expenditure on dealing with the consequences of drug use was estimated to be $1.9 billion, with the majority the result of crime-related consequences. Conclusion. Several insights result from estimating these expenditures. First, law enforcement is the largest drug policy component, with Australian governments also spending significant amounts on treatment and prevention programmes. Secondly, apart from the prevention component, Australia's drug policy mix is strikingly similar to recent international estimates. Finally, expenditures associated with dealing with the consequences of illicit drugs are large and important for assessing drug-related public sector expenditure. [source]


Effects of taxation for option writers: an Australian perspective

ACCOUNTING & FINANCE, Issue 1 2007
Karen Alpert
G180; C200; K340 Abstract Writing an option is a taxable event for Australian investors. This method of taxation penalizes investors who hold open short option positions over the tax year end by accelerating their tax liability relative to the timing of the economic gain from writing options. This paper examines the levels of open interest in the Australian Stock Exchange over the change in financial year to determine whether investors time their transactions to avoid this tax acceleration. The results show that level of open interest is lower in the last month of the financial year after controlling for non-tax determinants of option demand. [source]


Is there an association between referral population deprivation and antibiotic prescribing in primary and secondary care?

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHARMACY PRACTICE, Issue 4 2008
Christopher Curtis head of pharmaceutical services
Objective The study was designed to explore the presence of any relationship between NHS secondary care antibiotic prescribing rates or primary care antibiotic prescribing rates and the levels of deprivation experienced within the referred primary care population. The study also aimed to determine whether the antibiotic prescribing rates for each care sector were correlated. Method The study was conducted in 12 English hospital trusts of mixed size and case-mix. Antibiotic usage data (Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical (ATC) category J01) for the financial year, ending March 2001/2002 were used to calculate hospital trust prescribing rates (using the defined daily dose/finished consultant episode indicator). Primary care antibiotic prescribing data were obtained from the Prescription Pricing Authority (antibiotic items prescribed per 1000 residents) for the year 2001/2002. Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) 2000 deprivation data were obtained from the regional public health observatory websites for each of the primary care trusts within the relevant study areas. Key findings No correlation could be established between the weighted index of multiple deprivation of the treated population and antibiotic prescribing rates at each hospital trust. Primary care antibiotic prescribing rates were not found to correlate with antibiotic prescribing rates in the geographically associated hospital trust. Data from all 12 sites showed that the IMD 2000 measures and primary care prescribing rates were weakly correlated, with higher antibiotic prescribing rates being generally observed in areas of primary care exhibiting the worst levels of deprivation Conclusions The likely explanations for the present findings are that deprivation-related illnesses are principally treated within primary care, whereas hospital antibiotic prescribing principally results from procedures isolated within secondary care or through the additional influence of nosocomial infection. Therefore, medicines management measures geared to controlling antibiotic prescribing in secondary care should not focus upon the levels of deprivation in the referred population, whereas those in primary care should. [source]


Report of the Council for the session 2006,2007

JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL STATISTICAL SOCIETY: SERIES A (STATISTICS IN SOCIETY), Issue 4 2007
Council Report
President's foreword., This year's annual report shows another very successful year for the Society. The range of the Society's new initiatives bears testament to our vigour and to the energy and enthusiasm of Fellows and staff. It is difficult to summarize all of these but I offer a brief overview of some of the highlights. This year we have awarded the first annual prize for ,Statistical excellence in journalism'. It is too easy to bemoan the general quality of coverage of statistical issues in the press and other media. But simply moaning does not improve the situation. As a positive step, on the instigation of Sheila Bird and Andrew Garratt, the Society decided to initiate an award for the best journalistic coverage of a statistical issue. This year first prize was awarded to Ben Goldacre of The Guardian. I hope that these annual awards will offer a positive focus on good coverage and help us to promote best practice. This year, also, we have set up the Professional Development Centre to act as a focus for statistical training both for statisticians and for others who use statistical methods as part of their work. It thus reflects our support for continuing professional development for our Fellows and at the same time provides outreach to members of the statistical user community who want to improve their statistical skills. We welcome Nicola Bright as the Director of the Centre and wish her every success. I am pleased to say that it is not just the Society centrally that has taken new activities this year. The Manchester Local Group have initiated a prize for final year undergraduates from any higher education institute in the north-west. At a time when there are concerns about the number of well-qualified graduates coming into the statistics profession this seems an excellent way to attract the attention of final year undergraduates. I wish this initiative every success. Another development to which the Society has contributed is the Higher Education Funding Council for England project ,more maths grads' which is designed to promote participation in undergraduate degrees in the mathematical sciences. A good supply of mathematically trained graduates is essential to the UK economy in general and to the health of the statistics discipline in particular. It is good that the Society is involved in practical developments that are aimed at increasing participation. The final new initiative that I shall draw attention to is the ,first-in-man' report which is concerned with the statistical design of drug trials aimed at testing novel treatment types. The working party was set up as a result of the adverse reactions suffered by healthy volunteers to a first-in-man trial of monoclonal antibodies and who were subsequently admitted to Northwick Park hospital. The report makes a series of recommendations about the design of such trials and will, I hope, contribute to the safety of future trials. I would like to thank Stephen Senn and the members of the working party for their considerable efforts. As well as these new initiatives there were, of course, many other continuing activities that are noteworthy. The annual conference in Belfast was a great success with many lively sessions and a good number of participants. In particular it was good to see a high number of young statisticians participating in the conference, reflecting the continuing impact of the Young Statisticians Forum on which I commented in the previous annual report. Another continuing activity for the Society is the statistical legislation going through Parliament as I write. The Society has long campaigned for legislation for official statistics. The issue now is to try to get good legislation which will have the required effect and will help the Government Statistical Service and other statistical producers to produce high quality, authoritative statistics in an environment that commands public confidence. As first published, the Society was disappointed with the Bill but we have worked to build support for amendments that, in our view, are essential. Time alone will tell how effective the final legislation will be in meeting our aims. I would like to draw attention to the success of the Membership Services team. We, although with other statistical Societies, have experienced a decline in membership in recent years but the team have turned this round. They are helping to recruit new Fellows and to retain the commitment of existing Fellows. This is a fine achievement and I would like to thank Nicola Emmerson, Ed Swires-Hennessy and the whole team. Finally we have, at last, reached a conclusion in our dealings with the Privy Council and will implement the second phase of constitutional changes. In future our business year, financial year and year for elected appointments will all coincide on a calendar year basis. There will be transitional arrangements but in due course all our administrative arrangements will coincide and will improve efficiency and co-ordination. This has been a long journey, steered effectively by our Director General, Ivor Goddard, and I congratulate him for a successful outcome on your behalf. As you read this report, I hope that you will share my impression of a Society that is lively and spawning many new programmes. We have a dual commitment: to the well-being of statistics as a discipline and to the promotion of statistical understanding and practice to the benefit of Society at large. In both respects I feel that the Society is in good health. This is due to the unstinting efforts of a large number of individual volunteers, including in particular our Honorary Officers and also, of course, the staff at Errol Street. On behalf of all Fellows, I wish to express my thanks to everyone involved. Tim Holt [source]


Art Museum Attendance, Public Funding, and the Business Cycle

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIOLOGY, Issue 2 2009
Sarah J. Skinner
There are a number of important problems in contemporary museum finance, and this article identifies yet another possible difficulty. An aggregate statistical measure of museum attendance is calculated in this research and the attendance measure is shown to be countercyclical in nature. When set against federal and other allocations to museums, which are clearly pro-cyclical in nature, an attendance "disease" may be at least tentatively identified. Efficiency criteria, of course, require that costs are covered in real time. We find, however, that, despite the likelihood that museum attendance is income-elastic and a normal good, attendance varies countercyclically with the business cycle. We suggest that one possible explanation for this phenomenon is that a positive substitution effect on demand outweighs the income effect on demand for museum attendance over the cycle. From a policymaking perspective, these results call for a longer range planning horizon, that is, one that includes the full business cycle rather than just the financial year, as is the current U.S. government practice. [source]


Flattening the Effective Marginal Tax Rate Structure in Australia: Policy Simulations Using the Melbourne Institute Tax and Transfer Simulator

THE AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 2 2003
John Creedy
This article uses the Melbourne Institute Tax and Transfer Simulator to examine the effects of a reduction in the means-tested benefit taper, or withdrawal, rates in Australia to 30 per cent. That is, all taper rates of 50 per cent and 70 per cent in the March 1998 benefit system are reduced to 30 per cent, while leaving all basic benefit levels unchanged. This change is therefore expected to ,flatten' the tax structure by reducing the high marginal tax rates applying to those with relatively low incomes and increasing the marginal tax rates of medium incomes. Simulations in which all individuals are assumed to remain at their pre-reform labour supply levels are compared with behavioural simulations in which the majority of individuals are free to adjust the number of hours worked. The results reflect only the supply side of the labour market. The database used is the 1997-98 Survey of Income and Housing Costs, so that weekly incomes are based on the financial year 1997-98. The comparison shows that, for sole parents, accounting for behavioural effects of the reform results in a lower estimated expenditure for government, whereas for couples, accounting for behavioural effects results in a higher estimated expenditure. [source]


Emergency department performance at a small rural hospital: An independent in-depth review

AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF RURAL HEALTH, Issue 6 2009
Paul Tescher
Abstract Objectives:,This study aims to provide a retrospective review of the recent performance of the emergency department of Cobram District Hospital, a small rural hospital located on the border of Victoria and New South Wales. Design:,Retrospective review. Setting:,Small rural accident and emergency department. Intervention:,All available data collected from the emergency department from the previous three financial years (July 2005 to June 2008) were compiled onto a computerised spreadsheet and analysed by two independent investigators. Main outcome measures:,Key performance indicators, including time for patient to be seen by a doctor and frequency of patient presentations to the emergency department. Results:,Cobram District Hospital has fewer than 5000 patients presenting to the emergency department each year. 12 p.m. to 12 a.m. accounts for 69% of all presentations, with three notable time periods that experience most presentations. Life-threatening emergencies represented <3% of all presentations to the emergency department. Patients in triage categories 1,3 did not met Australasian triage scale (ATS)-suggested time for maximum waiting timing, while categories 4 and 5 well exceeded ATS standards. Conclusion:,The small size and lack of dedicated emergency department staff place restrictions on the ability of an unfunded rural hospital to match the performance of major metropolitan emergency departments. ATS guidelines should be revised to improve clarity and reflect the different performance capabilities between metropolitan and rural centres. [source]