In mid-September of this year, a Matter of Urgency was referred to Mr Grant Hehir, the Commonwealth Auditor General, Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) by Senator Michaela Cash.
The issue was allegations that millions of taxpayer dollars had been the subject of fraud and corruption amongst senior staff of the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency and that a decision was made by ANAO not to investigate these allegations. I wanted to know why.
During senate estimates, Mr Hehir informed me that it was true that a decision had been made by ANAO not to investigate the allegations and that this decision was made purely because a review into this is already being undertaken by the Attorney-General’s office. Mr Hehir said that ANAO is not an investigatory body and therefore any fraud investigation is not within its remit.
In the case of suspicion of fraud, ANAO could refer it to the appropriate body. ANAO’s role in this case would be to undertake a performance audit and an audit of the government programme that funded this entity. The North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency receives government funding of $20 million to provide legal services in the area. I think an audit is long overdue.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for being here again. In mid-September this year a matter of urgency was referred to the Commonwealth Auditor-General, Mr Hehir, and the Australian National Audit Office by the
shadow legal affairs spokesperson, Michaelia Cash. The issue was the allegation that millions of taxpayer dollars had been the subject of fraud and corruption amongst senior staff of the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency. Allegations were made of extensive criminal conduct by some members of the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency’s leadership. Is it true that a decision was made by ANAO not to investigate the allegations?
Mr Hehir: We made a decision not to undertake an audit in that area after making inquiries into the space and identifying that a review in the area was being undertaken by—
Ms Mellor: Attorneys-general—around the jurisdictions.
Mr Hehir: Attorneys-general. We felt that it was best for that process to play out before we did anything, noting that we’re not an investigatory body, so we wouldn’t go in and undertake a fraud investigation. We would go in and do a performance audit of, effectively, the control framework of the entity, not a—
Ms Mellor: Corruption investigation.
Mr Hehir: corruption or a fraud investigation. That’s not within our mandate. That’s not what we do.
Senator ROBERTS: Correct me if I’m wrong here—I’m jumping ahead—but, if you went in and found evidence of fraud, someone else would come in and investigate it.
Mr Hehir: We would give it off to an investigative body, whether it be the AFP, the NACC or someone like that, to do it.
Senator ROBERTS: So there was already an investigation of that kind going on.
Mr Hehir: I understand there’s a review being—
Ms Mellor: The jurisdictional attorneys-general agreed to conduct a joint review.
Senator ROBERTS: So it had nothing to do with the referendum that was upcoming or anything like that. It was just purely—
Mr Hehir: No.
Senator ROBERTS: Okay, that’s good.
Senator Colbeck: Do you conduct their annual audits?
Mr Hehir: It’s not a government entity.
Senator ROBERTS: So when will you review that decision and conduct an audit?
Mr Hehir: As I said, it’s not a government entity. So, if we were to audit, we would be auditing the government program that funded it. That’s the space that we would go in on. If there were information subsequent
to the review that the program looked like something that was worthwhile auditing, we would consider it in that context.
Senator ROBERTS: You may have to correct me if I’m wrong here, but is it possible that millions of dollars may have been misused when almost $20 million is provided to the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency each year to provide legal services? If that were your suspicion, you wouldn’t be doing it—you would hand it over to an investigative body.
Mr Hehir: If there were a suspicion of fraud, we wouldn’t investigate it—we would give it to an investigatory body. As I said, fraud investigation isn’t our purpose. When we do financial audits, we do control works to get assurance around whether fraud has been undertaken or not, but, again, if we suspect there’s fraud, we pass it onto someone else to do that sort of criminal-type investigation.
Senator ROBERTS: My further questions have to do with the corrupt use of money, so that’s not you—I mean, that’s not on you to investigate.
Chair: It’s maybe the agency that gives out the money. I might give the remaining time to Senator Nampijinpa Price.
Senator ROBERTS: I’d be happy with that.
Senator Colbeck: So, Mr Hehir, you would investigate the conduct of the program, not the operation of the organisation, because it’s not a government organisation.
Chair: No, you’d hand it over for criminal investigation.
Mr Hehir: We can follow the dollar into government funded entities and audit the entity. We do have the capacity to do that under our act.
Let me get this right, the Government Auditor can’t audit the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency, because it’s not a Government Body? But it can audit the Department who issued the $20M to the NAAJA? Such an audit would surely prove the Finance Department gave the money to this private Body and that would be the end of the audit? The Bureaucrats involved along the many steps of this money trail, along with the Management of NAAJA would be able to continue to feather their rather plump nests without intervention? Please send me, immediately, information on how I can get onto this Government Grant money. My Bill, while being substantial, would not be anywhere near $20M (for a start).