Browse our range of reports and publications including performance and financial statement audit reports, assurance review reports, information reports and annual reports.
- Regulators should assess the level of risk across the entire breadth of their regulation, and then target their monitoring and compliance activities at those areas with the highest level of risk.
- To support the development of controls and mitigation strategies and an assessment of the effectiveness of controls, fraud risks should be broken down into specific elements relevant to the source of the risk.
- Crises require rapid responses. Preparedness for crisis response should occur in a non-crisis setting and requires robust planning informed by risk assessments. Testing and exercising helps to ensure that roles and responsibilities are clearly defined and understood. These mechanisms also help to ensure that entities can implement relevant plans quickly and, where multiple stakeholders are involved, in a coordinated manner. Regular evaluation of preparedness, including risk reviews to identify new and emerging risks and threats and allow for minor course corrections over time, rather than requiring a significant shift without sufficient testing.
- Fraud and corruption risks need to be clearly covered in entities’ fraud and corruption control plans and these plans be informed by thorough risk assessments, and mitigated by effective controls.
- For regulatory entities, external fraud risks need to be clearly covered in their fraud and corruption control plans and be informed by thorough risk assessments and mitigated by effective controls.
- Setting a benchmark against which performance is assessed can improve organisational effectiveness and assist an entity to make decisions about when and how to deploy its resources. To ensure benchmarks are reliable, verifiable and free from bias, entities should regularly review performance measures (including targets and benchmarks) and amend if necessary to ensure they are fit for purpose.
- Management of fraud and corruption risk should not be a ‘set and forget’ compliance exercise. Entities must conduct risk assessments of fraud and corruption when there are substantial changes in structure, functions or activities.
- Transcribing meetings of assessment panels provides a comprehensive record of key inputs to decision-making. It is consistent with accountability and transparency principles of the Commonwealth Grants Rules and Principles, and represents better practise in grants administration. The benefits of transcriptions to entities include: streamlining record keeping; supporting entities to demonstrate the basis for funding recommendations and decisions; and supporting the provision of feedback to unsuccessful applicants (the Commonwealth Grants Rules and Principles outline that feedback promotes transparency in decision-making and improves the capacity of potential grantees to apply for future grant activities).
- Entities can demonstrate compliant, transparent, and accountable procurement processes through the creation and retention of appropriate records, including for: decisions on the procurement approach; assessment against selection criteria; engagement with tenderers; and the rationale for proceeding to negotiations.
- Early engagement with evaluation expertise is needed to determine the appropriate type of evaluation for the policy or program, to identify and manage evaluation risks, and ensure the collection, and appropriate assessment, of data and information to draw robust policy conclusions.
- When establishing a performance measurement framework, it is important to clearly define performance benchmarks and develop relevant, reliable and complete indicators and targets in order to facilitate a meaningful assessment of progress and outcomes.
- Entities can demonstrate compliant, transparent and accountable procurement processes through the creation and retention of appropriate records, including for: decisions on the procurement approach; the shortlisting of options; the method for assessing value for money; assessment against selection criteria; and the rationale for the decision that was made.
- To support the management of conflicts of interest, declarations must be sufficiently detailed to facilitate a risk assessment and develop a management plan that will address the risk. Communicating key measures from conflict management plans assists with implementing measures.
- Where conflict of interest issues arise during a grant assessment, procurement or recruitment activity, it may be appropriate to pause the activity to investigate and address the issues and recommence when the issues have been resolved.
- The core rule of the Commonwealth Procurement Rules (CPRs) is achieving value for money, irrespective of the type of procurement process undertaken. Responsibility for assessing value for money rests with officials under the CPRs, including for processes where ministers are the final decision-makers on procurement outcomes. Officials discharge this responsibility by undertaking activities that include:
- undertaking a value for money assessment as required under the CPRs;
- advising ministers on the outcome of the value for money assessment;
- advising ministers of CPR requirements; and
- maintaining records as required under the CPRs.
- Effective risk management during procurement processes is supported by identifying, assessing and treating procurement risks early in the process and thereafter on an ongoing basis, including developing and maintaining a risk management plan, risk registers, and mitigation strategies for all risks.
- When delivering a package of initiatives intended to contribute to common policy objectives, entities should establish arrangements to provide coordinated governance, risk assessment and reporting across all programs and initiatives. This should include appropriate levels of oversight over how the programs and initiatives are performing against the overall policy objectives.
- When transitioning from an existing business management system to a replacement system, senior management should carefully assess and actively manage risks relating to the possible degradation of the existing system and non-compliance with requirements relating to its operation.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 11 of 2020–21)
Published: Monday 28 September 2020
Published
The ANAO conducted separate audits of the Indigenous Advancement Strategy (IAS) Children and Schooling program and the Safety and Wellbeing program, the findings and conclusions of which are presented in this report. The objective of the audits was to assess the effectiveness of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet’s and the National Indigenous Australians Agency’s administration of the IAS Children and Schooling and the Safety and Wellbeing programs.
Entity
National Indigenous Australians Agency
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 13 of 2024–25)
Published: Thursday 14 November 2024
Published
The objective of the audit was to assess the effectiveness of the implementation and award of funding for Round 1 of the Growing Regions Program.
Entity
Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communication and the Arts; Department of Industry, Science and Resources
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 23 of 2019–20)
Published: Wednesday 15 January 2020
Published
The objective of the audit was to assess whether the award of funding under the Community Sport Infrastructure Grant Program was informed by an appropriate assessment process and sound advice.
Entity
Australian Sports Commission
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
- Entities should consider the risk of expanded or varied program eligibility and assessment criteria, which could either disadvantage some applications or lead to an expansion in the program’s size, when designing a grant program to deliver election commitments.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 12 of 2019–20)
Published: Tuesday 5 November 2019
Published
The objective of the audit was to assess whether the award of funding under the Regional Jobs and Investment Packages program was informed by appropriate departmental advice and that processes complied with the grants administration framework.
Entity
Department of Industry, Innovation and Science; Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Cities and Regional Development
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 16 of 2021–22)
Published: Monday 14 February 2022
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess whether the award of funding under the Safer Communities Fund was effective and consistent with the Commonwealth Grant Rules and Guidelines.
Entity
Department of Home Affairs; Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 28 of 2023–24)
Published: Wednesday 22 May 2024
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess the effectiveness of the design and award of funding for Round 6 of the Mobile Black Spot Program.
Entity
Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 16 of 2024–25)
Published: Wednesday 11 December 2024
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess the effectiveness of the design process for the Energy Price Relief Plan.
Entity
Department of the Treasury; Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 35 of 2024–25)
Published: Monday 26 May 2025
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess whether the award of funding under the Disaster Ready Fund was effective and consistent with the published guidelines.
Entity
National Emergency Management Agency
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 5 of 2019–20)
Published: Thursday 1 August 2019
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess the effectiveness of the Australian Research Council’s (ARC’s) administration of the National Competitive Grants Program (NCGP).
Entity
Australian Research Council
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
Performance audit (Auditor-General Report No. 35 of 2019–20)
Published: Thursday 30 April 2020
Published
The objective of this audit was to assess the effectiveness of grant program management by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).
Entity
Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA)
Contact
Please direct enquiries through our contact page.
- The risks of contracted advisers having a conflict of interest with potential/actual market respondents should be fully considered and addressed.
