Australia’s passport office has been accused of misappropriating contracts worth millions of dollars as more than a dozen officials are investigated for possible misconduct.
The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) accused the national passport office of breaching financial laws in a damning audit released this week.
The report details serious problems with the department’s handling of procurement contracts worth more than $1.5 billion between 2019 and 2023, including the cancellation of a conference at a popular tourist destination at a cost of $135,000.
The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFAT) was found to have failed to comply with federal procurement rules by failing to declare conflicts of interest and not being “competitive” or “transparent” during decision-making.
DFAT is now investigating at least 18 people, both employees and contractors, in relation to the passport office’s procurement activities.
Some of the most alarming findings include four officials spending more than $30,000 on two trips to Port Douglas in northern Queensland in late 2022 and February 2023 to inspect it as a possible venue for a major conference.
The meeting was moved to Canberra and taxpayers were charged more than $104,000 in “cancellation fees and a non-refundable deposit paid to a resort in Port Douglas.”
“The acquisition of a resort in Port Douglas did not meet the requirements of DFAT’s procurement policy and did not represent good value for money,” the auditor general said in the report.
The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has accused the Australian Passport Office (APO) of misappropriating contracts, including canceling a conference in tourist hotspot Port Douglas (pictured) at a cost of $135,000 in an explosive audit published this week.
In another case, an APO official had coffee with a Deloitte employee to discuss a potential contract.
The resulting documents were allegedly falsified to claim that this was an “unsolicited proposal” from Deloitte.
The cost of the contract reportedly skyrocketed nearly 1,000 percent in 30 months, to more than $3.5 million.
‘The (DFAT) approval record incorrectly indicated that Deloitte had ‘submitted an unsolicited proposal,’ the report states.
In response to the audit, Deloitte said the cumulative impact of the contract breach was more than $1.1 million, not $3.5 million.
Deputy Foreign Minister Tim Watts said: “The Albanian government takes these issues very seriously and is investigating further.”
‘Since the election of the Albanese Government, we have been supporting the Australian Passport Office to undertake long overdue improvements to its internal systems and processes to ensure it can efficiently deliver services to Australians.
“The government will consider any further action that needs to be taken in response.”
Following the report, DFAT said it had accepted a number of recommendations, while the passport office had implemented measures to “address cultural and procurement issues”.