Publication governance

Conflicts of interest

Material involvement is disclosed so readers can assess independence and limitations.

Disclosure standard

Personal, professional, financial or procedural involvement material to interpretation must be disclosed on the publication record.

Effect of disclosure

Disclosure does not validate or disqualify an output. It enables scrutiny of independence, source selection, analytical limits and the need for external verification.

Author-participant safeguards

Where the author is also a reporting person or participant, primary records, third-party statements, analytical inference and legal characterisation must remain distinguishable. The author’s interpretation is not treated as self-validating evidence.