Preface

Introduction

The Australian Accounting Standards Board (AASB) makes Australian Accounting Standards, including Interpretations, to be applied by:

(a) entities required by the Corporations Act 2001 to prepare financial reports;

(b) governments in preparing financial statements for the whole of government and the General Government Sector (GGS); and

(c) entities in the private or public for-profit or not-for-profit sectors that are reporting entities or that prepare general purpose financial statements.

Australian Accounting Standards incorporate International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs), including Interpretations, issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), with the addition of paragraphs on the applicability of each Standard in the Australian environment.

Australian Accounting Standards also include requirements that are specific to Australian entities. These requirements may be located in Australian Accounting Standards that incorporate IFRSs or in other Australian Accounting Standards. In most instances, these requirements are either restricted to the not-for-profit or public sectors or include additional disclosures that address domestic, regulatory or other issues. In developing requirements for public sector entities, the AASB considers the requirements of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSASs), as issued by the International Public Sector Accounting Standards Board (IPSASB) of the International Federation of Accountants.

Private sector for-profit entities complying with Australian Accounting Standards will simultaneously comply with IFRSs. Many other entities complying with Australian Accounting Standards will also simultaneously comply with IFRSs.

Reasons for Issuing AASB 1048

Australian Accounting Standards that apply to annual reporting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2005 include International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs). IFRSs comprise Accounting Standards and Interpretations. IFRSs are issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), and their adoption in Australia is in accordance with a strategic direction made by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC).

This Standard clarifies that all Australian Interpretations have the same authoritative status. Those that are equivalent to the IASB Interpretations must be applied to achieve compliance with IFRSs. Australian Interpretations issued by the AASB comprise both AASB and UIG Interpretations. UIG Interpretations were developed by the Urgent Issues Group, a former committee of the AASB.

Need for a Service Standard

In the Australian context, Australian Interpretations do not have the same legal status as Standards (delegated legislation) and are treated as ‘external documents’ by the Acts Interpretation Act 1901 and the Legislative Instruments Act 2003. Although references in one Standard to a second Standard are ambulatory (automatically moving forward to refer to the most recently-issued version of the second Standard), references in a Standard to external documents are stationary (being fixed in time to refer to the contents of the external document when the Standard was issued). A simple reference to an Australian Interpretation in an AASB Standard can only refer to the Interpretation that existed when the Standard was issued. It cannot refer to any revised version of the Interpretation that may exist at a later reporting date. However, an AASB Standard can refer to a second AASB Standard and, when the first Standard is applied at a later reporting date, the reference will be to the then-current version of the second Standard, even if it has been re-issued since the first Standard was issued.