EUROSAI. Magazine N18 - 2012

> 16 < EUROSAI ACTIVITIES EUROPEAN ORGANISATION OF SUPREME AUDIT INSTITUTIONS www.eurosai.org No. 18 - 2012 Session I—Enhancing Stakeholder Confidence: Auditing Management Integrity, Accountability and “Tone at the Top” Credibility is a key factor for Supreme Audit Institutions and it can be achieved by enhancing accountability, transparency, integrity and tone at the top within these organizations. This session was presided by the SAI of Portugal as president of EUROSAI. As it was stated by the EUROSAI members in the last Congress, held in Lisbon,“transparency and accountability are both democratic values and are fundamental for good governance. Accountability is a broad concept including a wide range of responsibilities for public managers, such as professional and management skills, compliance with financial and other regulations, meeting performance expectations and ethical conduct”. SAI of Portugal in its presentation highlighted the importance of having methodological base for ensuring ethical government that consists of audit manual describing strategies and rules for ethical behavior. ISSAI 30 , the INTOSAI Code of Ethics, is also a constant reference for auditors. But provisions for the ethical behavior is not enough, so SAIs should look into the implementation measures as well. The SAI of Portugal looks at 3 aspects of ensuring the ethical behavior: • Guidance. • Management. • Control. For each of these certain actions are needed: guidance can be reinforced by detailed advice for the code of ethics and training, the management should favor ethical behavior of its employees and making ethical criteria for annual performance evaluations. For control n As it was stated by the EUROSAI members in the last Congress, held in Lisbon, “transparency and accountability are both democratic values and are fundamental for good governance. n