Page 2813 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 24 June 2009
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The Chief Minister went after the Auditor-General in such a way, demanding audits into her performance. There is also the issue of the amount of money that has been put in the appropriation bill. We are not talking about vast sums of money, but what we are talking about is a role that is of immense importance to the Assembly. Certainly there are problems with her resourcing; these have been articulated. They arose out of estimates. I refer to the annual report 2007-08 and the Auditor-General’s view in that document, so this is not news:
It has been increasingly difficult to provide sufficient audit coverage of all important ACT public services, given the increased costs of audits and the limited resources of a small Office.
So certainly she is experiencing a reduction in her capability. But what does that actually mean? We can throw dollar signs around and we can say it is 30 staff, 40 staff or 20 staff; but what does that actually mean in real terms? I have looked at the number of audits that were conducted in the time of the Stanhope government. Let us turn to when Mr Stanhope first was elected under the aspirations of open and honest and accountable government and a certain approach. Certainly his statements at that time were admirable. There were 12 audits, so 12 audits were conducted. We would always want more, but that was a good starting point, based on his aspiration for open and accountable government.
But, if you review the number of audits that have been conducted over the years since he got into government, you will see that that figure has steadily been eroded to the point at which in the last couple of years we have had a figure of eight audits that have been conducted, and the Auditor-General—
Mr Smyth: Or six next year.
MR HANSON: Indeed, Mr Smyth; the Auditor-General has said that, because of the amount that has been appropriated in the bill that we discussed yesterday, that is going to be reduced to a figure of six.
How is it that a government that has lauded its performance in terms of openness and accountability, has said that these were its very principles, its core values, when it went to an election in 2001 has in effect provided a drip feed of funding to the Auditor-General which has resulted in that reduction. It is not a myth. It is not something that we are simply making up here for a political purpose. This is clear evidence that we are now going into a situation where the Auditor-General’s performance audits in the ACT will be halved under a Stanhope government. Is that openness and accountability? I would think not. I would like to have seen a position where we went from 12 audits to 24 audits; that would have been far more in line with the Chief Minister’s rhetoric.
So, moving forward, what does this mean? What does this mean for the Auditor-General? We have heard that it means six audits and in her words:
The Audit Office expects that there will continue to be a significant number of requests for performance audits and investigations from the community,
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