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Scathing criticisms of $1.3 billion military contract fully revealed for the first time
A report into the Defence Department's handling of a $1.3 billion dollar military contract has been fully released, nearly three years after the ABC exposed a high-powered legal effort to keep some details secret.
www.abc.net.au
Australian military's $1.3 billion Hawkei contract criticisms revealed after previously sealed by the Attorney-General
By Defence Correspondent Andrew Greene
Thales was awarded a contract to produce 1,100 locally built armoured Hawkei vehicles.(ABC News: Roy Frattinger)
A scathing report into the Defence Department's handling of a $1.3 billion dollar military contract has been fully released, nearly three years after the ABC exposed a high-powered legal effort to keep some details secret.
Key points:
- Thales had been awarded a sole-sourced contract by the Turnbull government in 2015
- The Auditor-General found the Commonwealth could have saved hundreds of millions if it stayed with the US contract
- A previously redacted paragraph said Hawkei did not appear to represent "value for money" when compared to the JLTV
The French multinational arms company also convinced Attorney-General Christian Porter to use extraordinary powers to black out six sensitive paragraphs from the ANAO's investigation into the light protected vehicle acquisition before it was published.
Thales was concerned about Auditor-General Grant Hehir's finding that the Commonwealth could have saved hundreds of millions of dollars if it had instead stayed with the United States joint light tactical vehicle (JLTV) program.
In 2015, Thales had been awarded a sole-sourced contract by the Turnbull government to produce 1,100 locally built Hawkeis after successfully lobbying the Commonwealth to ditch the JLTV program.
Now the Administrative Appeals Tribunal has ruled the ANAO entire 2018 report into the Thales project can be publicly released, after a successful application brought by Independent Senator Rex Patrick.
Kick the tyres on a Hawkei
In one previously unseen section of the report the ANAO concludes: "Defence has not clearly demonstrated that the acquisition provides value for money, as it did not undertake robust benchmarking in the context of a sole-source procurement."
"Publicly available information suggests that the (non-audited) per-unit price difference between the Hawkei and the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle exceeds the price difference advised to the Government."
Another previously redacted paragraph confirms that the ANAO advised Defence in August 2017 of its "preliminary finding that the Hawkei did not appear to represent value for money when compared to the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle".
The Attorney-General has always insisted he agreed to censor sections of the ANAO report on lawful grounds, but Senator Patrick says it is now clear Mr Porter made the wrong decision.
"What he chose to censor is criticism by the Auditor-General of the Defence Department's failure to follow proper processes to ensure taxpayers got value for money in a $1.3 billion sole source acquisition contract," Senator Patrick told the ABC.
"It is a totally inappropriate use of power ... he was covering up bureaucratic incompetence."
Labor MP Julian Hill said the Government had some explaining to do.
"His attempt to cover up billions of dollars of questionable procurement has been exposed and there are serious questions to answer," Mr Hill said.
In response, a spokesman for the Acting Attorney-General Peter Dutton said the information was not published after a "thorough and considered process".
"Following careful consideration of all of the information provided to the Attorney-General, which included the ANAO's draft report and lengthy submissions on a variety of issues from the auditor-general, from Thales Australia and from the former ministers for Defence and Defence Industry, it was ultimately determined that to publish certain information contained in the ANAO's audit report would be contrary to section 37 of the [Auditor-General's] Act.
"It is important to note that the relevant auditor-general report is, and has been, publicly available since September 2018, with only a small amount of particular information of the report redacted on these grounds."
