Financial reporting within the Transport Cluster continues to improve with reported misstatements down 96 per cent since 2011-12 to just three in 2015-16, according to a report released today by the NSW Auditor-General, Margaret Crawford.

Transport for NSW did not effectively plan and procure the CBD and South East Light Rail (CSELR) project to achieve best value for money according to a report released today by NSW Auditor-General, Margaret Crawford.

Transport for NSW is on track to deliver the project, but it will come at a higher cost with lower benefits than in the approved business case.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #278 - released 30 November 2016

The Family and Community Services report was released today by the Acting Deputy Auditor-General. Financial reporting within the cluster continues to improve but there are opportunities to improve governance and performance reporting.

The NSW Government’s ‘program evaluation initiative’, introduced to assess whether service delivery programs achieve expected outcomes and value for money, is largely ineffective according to a report released today by NSW Auditor-General, Margaret Crawford.

Government services, in areas such as public order and safety, health and education, are delivered by agencies through a variety of programs. In 2016–17, the NSW Government estimates that it will spend over $73 billion on programs to deliver services.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #277 - released 3 November 2016

New South Wales has a lower rate of foodborne illness than the national average. This reflects some good practices in the NSW Food Authority’s approach to monitoring food safety standards. It also is a factor of the long-standing commitment by local councils’ to ensuring retail food businesses meet these standards.

To ensure foodborne illness remains low, the Authority needs to better monitor its arrangements with councils which inspect retail food businesses on its behalf, and receive additional and more timely information from councils on compliance with food safety standards.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #274 - released 15 September 2016

Serious system limitations prevented TAFE NSW from providing sufficient and appropriate evidence to support recorded student revenue of $477 million, student receivables and accrued income of $47.6 million and unearned revenue of $398 million.
 
These limitations resulted in: 

• a qualified audit opinion being issued for TAFE NSW;
• delays in enrolling students;
• inability to fully reconcile cash balances;
• difficulties in reconciling student enrolments with revenues recorded in the financial statements;
• large volumes of manual processing.

Placement reviews are not undertaken for all children and young people in statutory care.  Caseworkers are required to review placements annually to assess the health, wellbeing, education and social life of the child. Over three-quarters of children and young people received placement reviews in 2014-15 compared to about half of them in the previous twelve months.

For the third consecutive year, the General Government and Total State Sector Accounts received an unqualified auditor’s opinion following more than a decade of qualifications.
 
Errors in agencies’ financial statements and the Total State Sector Accounts were corrected as necessary to ensure compliance with Australian Accounting Standards and the requirements of the Public Finance and Audit Act 1983.
 
Improvements to year-end financial reporting processes have enabled the Audit Office to issue 229 audit opinions by 2 October 2015, compared to only 67 by the same time in 2011.

Generally, NSW universities are in a sound financial position, but average operating margins are falling and operating expenditure is growing faster than operative revenue.
 
The university sector’s average operating margin fell from 6.6 per cent in 2013 to 4.8 per cent in 2014 and combined operating expenditure grew 0.9 per cent more than operating revenue. Employee expenses in 2014 increased by an average of 5.1 per cent and other expenses by 5.8 per cent.
 
Operating expenditure grew at a faster pace than operating revenue at six of the ten NSW universities.