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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 7 Hansard (20 June) . . Page.. 2166 ..


MR STANHOPE (continuing):

On 8 July 1998 the selected marketing consortium was advised that their proposal for provision of marketing and sales services was successful. The period of the contract was established as being 8 July 1998 to 7 July 1999 ...

On 5 November 1998 the marketing consortium was provided with a draft contract ...

Attempts to conclude a contract continued to June 1999. Finally, as the period in which the services to be provided was about to end, executives determined that the contractual rights and obligations between the parties were those contained in the Request for Tender ...

The Auditor commented in relation to this in classic understatement:

It is sound contract management practice to negotiate and finalise contractual arrangements prior to, or very soon after, the commencement of contracted work. No formal contract document was ever completed.

Is the Chief Minister aware that the request for tender issued to interested parties in May 1998 contained a draft contract-a contract for "the design, development and implementation of a marketing campaign and sales program for the redeveloped Bruce Stadium"? Given that the request for tender document contained a draft contract, why was no formal draft provided to the successful marketing consortium until November 1998, four months after its appointment?

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Stanhope has quite rightly picked up that the Auditor-General, in his report handed down yesterday, made some very critical comments on the handling of the contract with National Venue Management. I want to put very clearly on record that the government does not regard the way in which that episode was handled as a very effective example of good administration.

Mr Stanhope no doubt has read what the Auditor said, as have I and others in this place. I make no bones about the fact that the government handled that issue very badly. The way in which the process was handled up to the stage of selecting National Venue Management appears to have been satisfactory. The Auditor points out that the selection of NVM appears to have been an appropriate process. But after that point there were somewhat inexplicable breakdowns in procedure. There was a failure to properly execute a contract to embody the nature of the obligations that fell on the contractor to provide services in respect of the promotion and research of the stadium. Monitoring of the contract in particular did not occur appropriately.

I do not run away from those comments. I take to heart very seriously what the Auditor had to say. I intend to make sure that every lesson which is to be learnt from that experience is learnt by both government and public service. I intend to find out whether any further work is necessary in that respect and what steps need to be taken to ensure that those issues are not allowed to recur.

The report makes a number of recommendations on the processes from here. The Auditor recommends a number of processes, which are already in train, to provide for an effective change of culture-I do not think it is going too far to say that-in the public service in respect of such matters. He recommends more rigorous monitoring of


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