The audit reviewed Commonwealth National Parks involving total assets of $105 million with net operating costs of $41.77 million. Nineteen Commonwealth reserves are declared comprising six terrestrial national parks, one botanic garden and twelve marine parks and reserves totalling some 23 million hectares across Australia, its external territories and Commonwealth marine areas. The objective of the audit was to examine and report on the adequacy of the planning, management and reporting systems which support the Director of National Parks in the achievement of required functions under relevant legislation and agreed outputs and outcomes.

The Australian Public Service Commission's Delivering for Tomorrow: APS Workforce Strategy 2025 states that the Australian Public Service (APS) will continue to deploy a flexible approach to resourcing that strikes a balance between a core workforce of permanent public servants and the selective use of external expertise. This will mean a continuing mixed workforce approach, where APS employees and non-APS workers are used to deliver outcomes within agencies. In this context, the strategy highlights the value of ensuring that agencies take a structured approach to the use of non-APS employees.

In a series of three performance audits, the ANAO has examined the arrangements established by Services Australia, the Department of Veterans' Affairs and the Department of Defence for the use, engagement and management of contractors against the same audit objective and criteria.

The overall objective of the audit was to assess AusAID's management of commercial contracts to deliver Australia's overseas aid program. To this end, the audit examined whether:

• there are sound supporting structures for contract management;
• AusAid effectively manages risks;
• contracts clearly define deliverables;
• services are delivered and payments are made in accordance with the contract;
• there are appropriate arrangements to manage contractor performance;
• strategies appropriately assess and allocate risk between AusAid and contractors; and
• contracts deliver the desired aid outcomes.

The IIF program is designed to redress the low level of provision in Australia of high risk venture capital for small new technology - based companies commercialising research and development. The objective of the audit was to determine whether the IIF program was being effectively managed by the Industry Research and Development (IR&D) Board and the Department of Industry, Tourism and Resources to achieve the program objectives. The audit focused on corporate governance arrangements for program administration, the selection process to award licences, the safeguards to protect the Commonwealth's financial interests, management of licence agreements, and program performance management. The audit also examined program results to date from available data.

The audit objective was to assess the appropriateness of the use and reporting of confidentiality provisions in Australian Government contracts. This included assessing compliance with the Order and following up on the implementation of recommendations made in previous Senate Order audits.

The audit involved three components:

• an examination of a stratified random sample of 150 contracts listed as containing confidentiality provisions from material and small agencies across the Australian Government to determine whether confidentiality provisions were used and reported appropriately;
• an examination of all FMA Act agencies' calendar year 2009 contract listings, and ministers' letters of advice, to assess compliance with the requirements of the Order, and check reported instances of excluded contracts; and
• a follow-up of the implementation of previous audit recommendations relating to the administration of the Senate Order in four agencies. The selected agencies were the: Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID); Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA); Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF); and the Federal Court of Australia (Federal Court). The selected agencies were audited in one of the ANAO's previous five audits of Senate Order compliance.

Networking the Nation was established with effect from 1 July 1997 to support activities and projects designed to meet a range of telecommunications needs in regional, rural and remote Australia. Funding is provided by the Regional Telecommunications Infrastructure Fund. The program provides total support of $250 million, of which $50 million was to be allocated annually for the five year period from 1997-98. Funding decisions for grants are the responsibility of an independent Board appointed by the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts. The objectives of the audit were to examine the administration of the program with a view to ascertaining the scope for improving administration and to provide assurance on the equity, efficiency and effectiveness of the management and administrative processes applied in the administration of grants under the program.

This audit would assess the design and governance underpinning the National Indigenous Australians Agency’s and the Attorney-General’s Department’s joint establishment of an independent National Justice Reinvestment Unit and the effectiveness of the early delivery of up to 30 community-led justice reinvestment initiatives.

Targets 10 and 11 of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap relate to reducing adult and youth incarceration rates for First Nations peoples. The Attorney-General’s Department describes justice reinvestment as ‘a long-term, community-led approach that aims to prevent crime, address the drivers of contact with the justice system, and improve justice outcomes for First Nations people in a particular place or community’. Around $100m was announced for investments in community-led justice reinvestment initiatives and First Nations-led legal assistance services in the 2022–23 Federal Budget. This included $81.5 million over four years for justice reinvestment initiatives to be delivered in partnership with First Nations communities, plus $20 million per year from 2026–27. In the 2023–24 Federal Budget, the Australian Government committed an additional $10 million over four years to support place-based justice reinvestment partnerships located in the Central Australia region of the Northern Territory, under the $250 million plan for A Better, Safer Future for Central Australia.

This audit would assess the effectiveness of the Department of Education’s administration of the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). NCRIS provides funding for national research infrastructure including physical assets (such as the National Computational Infrastructure that supports Australia’s weather and climate modelling capability) and intangible assets (such as the Australian Research Data Commons, a portal that supports researchers to access and reuse existing data). It would examine areas relating to the department’s allocation of funding and ongoing engagement with NCRIS projects.

The Australian Government has committed to provide $4 billion NCRIS funding between 2018 and 2029. The program will receive an estimated $503 million in 2024–25. Funding is allocated on the basis of roadmaps, which provide a pathway to addressing Australia’s future research infrastructure needs. As at April 2024 NCRIS supports 26 funded projects and an international membership. The projects are led by organisations including universities, publicly funded research organisations and private companies. They form a network involving over 400 delivery partnerships, and employ over 1900 technical experts, researchers and facility managers. Users relying on NCRIS range from early career researchers and small businesses, who would otherwise struggle to access world class national research infrastructure, to global research leaders tapping into the unique facilities that NCRIS provides.

The objective of the audit was to assess the application of the outcomes and outputs framework in Australian Government agencies. The audit included a review of:

• the outcomes and outputs of agencies and the integration of the outcomes and outputs framework into agencies' operations;
• the extent to which agencies' performance indicators incorporated better practice characteristics to enable agencies to meet their performance reporting obligations;
• agencies' processes for capturing, monitoring and reporting financial and performance information and the extent to which outcomes and outputs information was used in agency decision-making; and
• the extent that agencies met their external reporting and accountability obligations.

The audit consisted of a survey of 44 agencies subject to the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997 (FMA Act) undertaken in October 2005 and detailed audit testing in three of those agencies. The purpose of the survey was to provide cross-agency data in relation to agencies' implementation of the framework during the period 2002–03 to 2005–06. The ANAO received responses from all 44 agencies, although not all agencies responded to all questions. The ANAO did not audit the information provided by survey participants and the reported results are based on agencies' responses to the survey.

The agencies at which detailed audit testing was undertaken were:

• Department of Education Science and Training;
• the then Department of the Environment and Heritage; and
• IP Australia.

This audit would examine the implementation of the National Environmental-Economic Accounting Strategy and Action Plan.

The Australian Government and all state and territory governments agreed on a national strategy and action plan to implement Environmental-Economic Accounting across Australia. This is intended to support nationally consistent application of the United Nations System of Environmental-Economic Accounting. As part of the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water’s (DCCEEW) 2023–24 Corporate Plan, DCCEEW has set targets for the next four financial years to finalise, release, and continue to release annual national environmental-economic accounts and environmental indicators.