T he T rue A nd F air V iew : A S tudy O f A ustralian A uditors ‘ A pplication O f the C oncept

A fundamental requirement of Australian corporate reporting is that financial statements be “true and fair”. This paper describes the history of the true and fair requirement in Australia, considers various meanings which have been attributed to the concept and examines the merits of eliminating the qualitative standard of the true and fair view. Special attention is given to auditors' definitions of the term, and how they design their audit testing of truth and fairness, as distinct from compliance with applicable accounting standards and other statutory disclosure requirements.