The determinants of assuring the quality in the activities of the control bodies

• Author: Sebastian Krzysztof Bentkowski
• Pages: 647-653

647

SEBASTIAN KRZYSZTOF BENTKOWSKI

THE DETERMINANTS OF ASSURING THE QUALITY IN THE

ACTIVITIES OF THE CONTROL BODIES

The multitude and variety of the inspections carried out by the

control bodies within the framework of using the public resources

involves the particular care of the quality of the control activities. The

analysis of working the institutions which dispose the public resources,

according to the criteria of legality, reliability, intentionality and

economy, allows, among others, to define the areas which require an

increase or decrease of the formality and it also allows to indicate the

irregularity in the realization of the tasks. The after control materials

constitute the basis of undertaking a series of management and

supervisory activities, and they are an important source of evidence for

the investigative authorities.

Care of the quality of control is determined also by the external

evaluation of Polish control bodies, carried out within the framework of

the so called partnership investigations, or during the common controls

with the international and the Union control institutions, e.g. in the years

2003 -2009 the European Court of Auditors together with the Supreme

Audit Institution carried out 53 inspections of using the Union resources.

The notion of quality was defined differently over the years. For

example, Plato used the notion of quality in relation to the things. He

defined the quality in terms of the level of perfection achieved by the

objects. Aristotle defined the quality as a set of features which distinguish

the given object from the others1. Some more contemporary definitions

extend a range of the notion of quality. A development of the

administration sciences, and particularly orienting this domain towards

providing for the clients’ needs, caused the popularization of the idea of

the quality assurance. The propagators of this direction, by the quality

name, describe a degree of providing for the clients’ needs and satisfying

the clients’ requirements (I. Oakland), the correspondence of a product

with the specific requirements (P.B. Crosby), a predictable degree of

homogeneity and reliability at possibly low costs and the adjustment to

the market requirements (W.E. Deming)2. According to W.E. Deming

and J.M . Juran the name of quality does not only refer to the things or

1 J.J. DAHLAORD, K. KRISTENSEN, G.K. KANJI, The bases of quality management,

Warszawa 2000, p. 25.

2 J. Bank: Management through quality, Warszawa 1996, p. 88.