Measuring the use of financial information by politicians in local government

This article presents a tool to assess levels of financial information (FI) use by politicians—the FIU Index. The index provides a multidimensional perspective, whereby items of information used are combined with the main types of meetings where FI is discussed (annual budgets and accounts), and also with members of political bodies (local council, parliament, executive, government, political committee, etc.) in which FI is used. Entities may be ranked as below or above the average of those considered for the analysis each year. The FIU Index evidences the need for improvement, so that politicians can make the best use of FI to improve decision-making and dialogue with various stakeholders. The importance of making financial information (FI) available to politicians is well recognized. However, despite the recent attention by scholars to the use of FI in political contexts and by politicians, empirical research has failed to produce accurate tools to assess the degree to which politicians make use of FI. This exploratory study proposes a new tool to analyse levels of FI use—the FIU Index. The level of use is assessed by the number of times an FI term is mentioned by politicians. A test case using the new index in Portuguese municipalities illustrates its potential.