December 2006: Work and Income, one of the main service delivery arms of the Ministry of Social Development, provides income support and work assistance to large numbers of New Zealanders. Its contact centre answers about 6 million calls a year. This performance audit assesses and reports on the contact centre’s management systems and the relationships between the contact centre and the rest of Work and Income...
November 2006: Overall, councils’ rates postponement policies are well designed, and councils are administering them in the interests of their communities. However, we have identified some areas where councils could improve their rates postponement policies and procedures...
October 2006: We undertook this audit to provide Parliament with a better understanding of where the Health Funding Package had been allocated between 2002 and 2005. The Ministry of Health had good documentation to support decisions on allocating the package. However, it is not possible to say from this audit how the Health Funding Package was ultimately spent, because district health boards, and many Ministry directorates, did not keep separate records of Health Funding Package funds...
October 2006: Article published in the Chartered Accountants Journal and reproduced here by kind permission of the Editor of the Journal.
October 2006: In the three months before the General Election on 17 September 2005, the Auditor-General became concerned that electioneering material may have been paid for by the Parliamentary Service out of resources appropriated for MPs’ and parliamentary parties’ advertising...
October 2006: In July 2003, we reported on the performance of the Inland Revenue Department’s taxpayer audit function. We went back to the Department to see what progress it had made in implementing our 11 recommendations...
September 2006, ISBN 0-478-18167-1.
June 2006: This good practice guide takes a principles-based approach to guide public entities’ decisions when they enter into funding arrangements with NGOs. The guide has been developed for both the central government and local government sectors – and the Auditor-General expects all public entities to demonstrate that they have considered and acted in keeping with these principles...
June 2006: School property is the second largest publicly owned property portfolio in the country, with a capital value of $7,000 million. The Ministry of Education has better controls in place than when we last audited school property management in 2001. However, it has only partly addressed our recommendations for improving its overview of the overall condition of the school property portfolio and the maintenance that school boards undertake...
June 2006, ISBN 0-478-18159-0.
June 2006: The Local Government Act 2002 created a new legal requirement for each local authority to adopt a code of conduct for its elected members. We examined councils' experiences in developing and using their codes...
June 2006: Housing New Zealand Corporation provides state housing to more than 190,000 people, and controls assets valued at more than $11 billion. With the allocation of more funding to meet housing needs – particularly in Auckland – we decided to audit the programmes used to acquire properties for state housing...
June 2006: The Board of Housing New Zealand Corporation asked me to consider undertaking an inquiry after allegations made by a former contractor of the Corporation appeared in the news media. The allegations were potentially serious, and warranted looking into...
May 2006: The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry identifies, inspects, and manages the decontamination of sea containers that pose the highest biosecurity risks. The Ministry is responsive to emerging risks. However, the Ministry has had more than 2 years to implement a revised Import Health Standard for sea containers, but it is not yet fully in place...
May 2006: The Department of Conservation is responsible for managing 8.5 million hectares of publicly owned land. We expected the Department, which manages nearly a third of New Zealand’s total land area, to have a very clear idea about what it was doing with the land...
May 2006: This is the second in a series of annual performance audits of grant programmes managed by public entities. This is to provide assurance to Parliament that grant programmes are well administered, with public funding allocated as intended by the Government...
May 2006: In May 2000, a once-only payment of $120 million was made to help the West Coast region’s economy adjust to the Government’s policies to end the logging of indigenous forest. Of this funding package, $92 million was placed with the West Coast Development Trust, and the remaining $28 million was divided equally between the 4 West Coast local authorities. This report looks at how these 5 entities have managed the use of the funding package...
April 2006, ISSN 1175-8258.
April 2006: This report provides museum staff with an independent assessment of collection management policies and practices against recognised principles of sound collection management, illustrates good practice, and suggests ways for museums and art galleries to work more effectively as individual institutions and collectively as a sector...
April 2006: This report sets out the outcome of our inquiry into the funding arrangements for the Green Party Ministerial liaison and relationship roles...
March 2006, ISBN 0-478-18152-3.
March 2006: In 2001, the WAVE Report brought together the health sector's recommendations for making more effective use of health information. The WAVE Report envisaged rapid change in 3 to 5 years. We looked at the progress made by the Ministry of Health, District Health Boards, and the health sector...
March 2006: Public service departments need to be able to respond effectively to the Government’s social and economic goals for Māori. This is particularly the case with the Treasury, which not only provides fiscal and economic advice on its own account, but provides a second opinion to the Government on other public service departments’ initiatives affecting Māori...
February 2006: This report draws on the experience of overseas jurisdictions, and provides examples of partnering arrangements that have been entered into in this country. The aim is to inform leaders and decision-makers about the key issues they need to consider across the public sector and for individual projects...
February 2006: The Police have made considerable improvements since 2001 in how they deal with dwelling burglary. This includes more effective use of forensic and intelligence analysis, increased accountability for results, and a greater sharing of good practice...
Performance of the contact centre for Work and Income
