Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee [Part 2], , 1:44:02 to 1:51:23
Inquiry into the number and monetary value of government programs related to climate change, energy, and the green economy.
Topics: Climate change, Renewable energy, Government spending
Speakers: Senator Susan McDonald, Ian Goodwin, Dr Caralee McLiesh, Unknown Speaker
>> thank you very much and thank you for um for coming this evening and for providing me with the list of the 2023 audit which summarized and visualized the Australian government entities involved in climate, energy, and the green economy. I note from your answer that this report has not been updated and that in 2026 the ANAO transition to an integrated three-year AAWP across all portfolio areas including the climate change, energy, environment and water portfolio. However, when I look at that program, I can't see the detail I'm after. So, I want to ask a simple question. Currently, how many programs across how many government agencies relate to climate, energy, and the green
Uh, thank you, Senator. We do not collect that information as you as you highlighted. We uh completed what was a one-off um exercise to assemble data on climate change uh and uh environmental uh projects back in 2023. uh that was used to help inform our thinking about priorities for our performance audit program. Um it's a resource inensive exercise to uh to complete and the exercise is also not an audit. It is um an analysis of of information. Uh so we have not we've not um updated that and are unable to uh give you give you updated data uh tonight. I do understand that um the climate change uh authority publishes a climate policy tracker which does uh I understand um outline uh different initiatives uh across across government. Um is there anything further that we can add to that?
So in the 2023 report when you identified 127 relevant programs again across 42 Australia government entities uh in the climate, energy and green economy. Um but you you so you haven't you you do have no idea what the updated number of programs and across how many entities there are. That's what you're telling me.
>> We have not updated uh that that data. We do as part of our planning for our audit program uh annually um look at budget papers and uh talk with uh with with entities in this case to quue about um their programs where the risk lies and uh where there might be an opportunity for an audit to uh to add value but that is not a a comprehensive exercise uh assembling data on programs as we did back in 2023.
>> Okay. So I noted that in your letter any updated information on the number and scope of relevant programs including budget allocations was considered as part of the AWP consistent with our standard practice in developing topics. >> That's right. >> You say considered where is this information and what is the value of
>> I'll [clears throat] ask my colleague Mr. Goodwin to respond. Ian Goodwin,
group executive director, performance audit. Um, so just to assist, the the information you're referring to, Senator, was a one-off analysis that was used um for two purposes. It was partly used in a presentation um that was talking to to that portfolio. >> Um, but it was also, as your general mentioned, to um deepen thinking around how we might target audits in in that portfolio. It it represented a point in time. That point in time being back in 2022. In terms of now what we do, we have an annual audit work program which is which is set out over a 12-month period and then a three-year period horizon. that reference that you're referring to in the orchard general's letter, Senator talks about looking at the portfolio budget statements um to get a sense of materiality and proportionality when selecting topics for that might be considered as part of going into the AAWP and then whether they those topics can then get drawn as a potential order topic. But it's it's about a sense of materiality and proportionality. So can
you provide the monetary value of each of those programs in 2023 >> part of that project?
>> What we would do is draw on the budget papers um the portfolio budget statements and we would also draw on discussions with relevant agencies to get a sense of understanding. It's not information that we're preparing. It's information that we're we're analyzing and digesting to get a sense of materiality and proportionality.
>> I get that. You can't identify materiality if you haven't identified the amounts.
>> Yeah, we would we would look at we would look at h what was this level of expenditure and we would do that not just within the context of of climate change. We would be looking that um both across the DQ portfolio but also across all other portfolios um take into account that we're trying to array a performance audit program of around 40 performance audits across the entire
public sector. I get that, but I'm still trying to understand how you assess materiality if you haven't identified the value of those programs that you
we when when looking at um so that that level of analysis that was done uh in 202022 >> um was probably um a much deeper analysis for a very specific purpose to to assist in a presentation. Um what we would be doing now is taking doing a macro analysis and and it's not just dollar dollar thresholds that would inform the auditor general around where we might put audit effort. It's take into account a range of other factors around risks as well as um priorities as well as learnings from other um jurisdictions. So it's it's a range of
factors. I understand what you're saying, but I'm just surprised that given that you'd gone to the effort of identifying the programs and the department, the detail of it, but then you didn't have a value next to each
>> I'm sorry. Are you talking about the 2022 report, Senator?
>> Yeah. The the attachment that you provided in your
>> Yeah. So, that's just drawing on public information.
>> Yeah. So, I can't I can't speak to numbers. I can't speak numbers. There are no numbers. Okay. So um so if you can't provide the data for there, you can't provide the up-to-date numbers either. >> In 2023, the ANAO said it has the capacity to conduct four to five performance audits per year that relate to the green economy or climate change and the environment. And as at 2023 that would mean mean it would take 25 years to audit the programs identified then in 22 23 is three to four audits still the ANO's