Reports
Actions for Supporting the District Criminal Court
Supporting the District Criminal Court
The Auditor-General for New South Wales, Margaret Crawford, released a report today on whether the Department of Communities and Justice (the department) effectively supports the efficient operation of the District Criminal Court system.
The audit found that in the provision of data and technology services, the department is not effectively supporting the efficient operation of the District Criminal Court system. The department has insufficient controls in place to ensure that data in the system is always accurate.
The department is also using outdated technology and could improve its delivery of technical support to courts.
The audit also assessed the implementation of the Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas reform. This reform aims to improve court efficiency by having more cases resolved earlier with a guilty plea in the Local Court. The audit found that the department effectively governed the implementation of the reform but is not measuring achievement of expected benefits, placing the objectives of the reform at risk.
The Auditor-General made seven recommendations to the department, aimed at improving the controls around courts data, reporting on key performance indicators, improving regional technical support and measuring the success of the Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas reform.
The District Court is the intermediate court in the New South Wales court system. It hears most serious criminal matters, except murder, treason and piracy. The Department of Communities and Justice (the Department) provides support to the District Court in a variety of ways. For example, it provides security services, library services and front-desk services. This audit examined three forms of support that the Department provides to the District Court:
- data collection, reporting and analysis - the Department collects data from cases in its case management system, JusticeLink, based on the orders Judges make in court and court papers
- technology - the Department provides technology to courts across New South Wales, as well as technical support for this technology
- policy - the Department is responsible for proposing and implementing policy reforms.
Recent years have seen a worsening of District Court efficiency, as measured in the Productivity Commission's Report on Government Services (RoGS). Efficiency in the court system is typically measured through timeliness of case completion. There is evidence that timeliness has worsened. For example, the median time from arrest to finalisation of a case in the District Court increased from 420 days in 2012–13 to 541 days in 2017–18.
As a result, the government has announced a range of measures to improve court performance, particularly in the District Court. These measures included the Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas (EAGP) reform. One of the objectives of EAGP is to improve court efficiency, which would be achieved by having more cases resolve with a guilty plea in the Local Court.
This audit assessed whether the Department of Communities and Justice effectively supports the efficient operation of the District Criminal Court system. We assessed this with the following lines of inquiry:
- Does the Department effectively collect, analyse and report performance information relevant to court efficiency?
- Does the Department effectively provide technology to support the efficient working of the courts?
- Does the Department have effective plans, governance and monitoring for the Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas reform?
The audit did not consider other support functions provided by the Department. Further information on the audit, including detailed audit criteria, may be found in Appendix two.
The Department is responsible for providing technology to the courts, which can improve the efficiency of court operations by making them faster and cheaper. The Department is also responsible for providing technical support to courtrooms and registries. It is important that technical support is provided in a timely manner because some technical incidents can delay court sittings and thus impact on court efficiency. A 2013 Organisation for Economic Co‑operation and Development report emphasised the importance of technology and digitisation for reducing trial length.
While the Department may provide technology to the courts, they are not responsible for deciding when, how or if the technology is used in the courtroom.
The Department is using a significant amount of outdated technology, risking court delays
As of April 2019, the whole court system had 2,389 laptops or desktop computers out of warranty, 56.0 per cent of the court system's fleet. The court system also had 786 printing devices out of their normal warranty period, 75.1 per cent of all printers in use. The Department also advised that many of its court audio transcription machines are out of date. These machines must be running for the court to sit and thus it is critical that they are maintained to a high degree. The then Department of Justice estimated the cost of aligning its hardware across the whole Department with desired levels at $14.0 million per year for three years. Figures for the court system were not calculated but they are likely to be a significant portion of this figure.
Using outdated technology poses a risk to the court system as older equipment may be more likely to break down, potentially delaying courts or slowing down court services. In the court system throughout 2018, hardware made up 30.8 per cent of all critical incidents reported to technical support and 41.9 per cent of all high priority incidents. In addition, 16.2 per cent of all reported issues related to printing devices or printing.
From 2017 to 2018, technical support incidents from courts or court services increased. There were 4,379 technical support incidents in 2017, which increased significantly to 9,186 in 2018. The Department advised that some outside factors may have contributed to this increase. The Department was rolling out its new incident recording system throughout 2017, meaning that there would be an under‑reporting of incidents in that year. The Department also advised that throughout 2018 there was a greater focus on ensuring that every issue was logged, which had not previously been the case. Despite these factors, the use of outdated technology has likely increased the risk of technology breakages and may have contributed to the increase in requests for technical support.
Refreshing technology on a regular basis would reduce the risk of hardware failures and ensure that equipment is covered by warranty.
The Department did not meet all court technical support targets in 2017 and 2018
The Digital and Technology Services branch (DTS) was responsible for providing technical support to the courts and the Courts and Tribunal Services branch prior to July 2019. DTS provided technical support in line with a Service Level Agreement (SLA) with the Department. In 2017, DTS did not provide this support in a timely manner. Performance improved in 2018, though DTS fell short of its targets for critical and moderate priority incidents. Exhibit 7 outlines DTS' targets under the SLA.
Priority | Target resolution time | Target percentage in time (%) |
1. Critical | 4 hours | 80 |
2. High | 1 day | 80 |
3. Moderate | 3 days | 85 |
4. Low | 5 days | 85 |
Source: Department of Communities and Justice, 2019.
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Critical incidents are particularly important for the Department to deal with in a timely manner because these include incidents which may delay a court sitting until resolved or incidents which impact on large numbers of staff. Some of the critical incidents raised with DTS specifically stated that they were delaying a court sitting, often due to transcription machines not working. High priority incidents include those where there is some impact on the functions of the business, which may in turn affect the efficiency of the court system. High priority incidents also include those directly impacting on members of the Judiciary.
This audit examined DTS' performance against its SLA in the 2017 and 2018 calendar years across the whole court system, not just the District Court. The total number of incidents, as well as critical and high priority incidents, can be seen in Exhibit 8.
Priority | 2017 | 2018 |
All | 4,379 | 9,186 |
1. Critical | 48 | 91 |
2. High | 128 | 315 |
Source: Audit Office of NSW analysis of Department of Communities and Justice data, 2019.
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The Department's results against its SLA in 2017 and 2018 are shown in Exhibit 9.
The Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas (EAGP) reform consists of five main elements:
- early disclosure of evidence from NSW Police Force to the prosecution and defence
- early certification of what the accused is going to be charged with to minimise changes
- mandatory criminal case conferencing between the prosecutor and accused's representation
- changes to Local Court case management
- more structured sentence discounts.
More detailed descriptions of each of these changes can be found in the Introduction. These reform elements are anticipated to have three key effects:
- accelerate the timing of guilty pleas
- increase the overall proportion of guilty pleas
- decrease the average length of contested trials.
Improving District Court efficiency is one of the stated aims of EAGP, which would be achieved by having more cases resolve in the Local Court and having fewer defendants plead guilty on the day of their trial in the District Court. The reform commenced in April 2018 and it is too early to state the impact of this reform on District Court efficiency.
The Department is responsible for delivering EAGP in conjunction with other justice sector agencies. They participated in the Steering Committee and the Working Groups, as well as providing the Project Management Office (PMO).
The Department is not measuring the economic benefits stated in the EAGP business case
The business case for EAGP listed nine quantifiable benefits which were expected to be derived from the achievement of the three key effects listed above. The Department is not measuring one of these benefits and is not measuring the economic benefits for five more, as shown in Exhibit 12.
Benefit | Economic benefit (over ten years) | Being measured? |
Accelerated timing of guilty pleas | $54.6m | |
Increased guilty plea rate | $90.7m | |
Decreased average trial length | $27.5m | |
A reduction in the delay of indictable matters proceeding to trial | N/A | |
Increase the number of finalised matters per annum | N/A | |
Reduction of the current backlog of criminal trials in the District Court | N/A | |
Reduction in bed pressure on the correction system due to reduced average time in custody |
$13.7m | |
Productivity improvements due to reduction in wasted effort | $53.3m | |
Bankable cost savings due to jury empanelment avoided | $2.5m |
Key | Measuring | Not measuring economic benefit | Not measuring |
While it is too early to comment on the overall impact of EAGP, better practice in benefits realisation involves an ongoing effort to monitor benefits to ensure that the reform is on target and determine whether any corrective action is needed.
The Department is measuring the number of finalised matters per annum and while the Department is not measuring the reduction in the backlog as part of this program, this measure is reported as part of the Department's internal reporting framework. The Department is not monitoring the reduction in delay of indictable matters proceeding to trial directly as part of this reform, but this does form part of the monthly Operational Performance Report which the Department sends to the EAGP Steering Committee.
The Department is not monitoring any of the economic benefits stated in the business case. These economic benefits are a mixture of bankable savings and productivity improvements. This amounts to a total of $242.3 million over ten years which was listed in the business case as potential economic benefits from the implementation of this reform against the total cost of $206.9 million over ten years. The Department is collecting proxy indicators which would assist in these calculations for several indicators, but it is not actively monitoring these savings. For example, the Department is monitoring average trial length, but is not using this information to calculate economic benefits derived from changes in trial length.
The Department is also not collecting information related to the average length of custody as part of this program. This means that it is unable to determine if EAGP is putting less pressure on the correctives system and it is not possible for the Department to calculate the savings from this particular benefit.
While stakeholders are optimistic about the impact of EAGP, not measuring the expected benefits stated in the business case means that the Department does not know if the reform is achieving what it was designed to achieve. Further, the Department does not know if it must take corrective action to ensure that the program achieves the stated benefits. These two things put the overall program benefits at risk.
The Department has not assigned responsibility for the realisation of each benefit stated in the business case. The Department holds the Steering Committee responsible for the realisation of all benefits. Benefits realisation is the process which ensures that the agency reaches benefits as stated in the business case. Assigning responsibility for benefits realisation to the Steering Committee rather than individuals is not in line with good practice.
Good practice benefits realisation involves assigning responsibility for the realisation of each benefit to an individual at the business unit level. This ensures there is a single point of accountability for each part of the program with knowledge of the benefit and the ability to take corrective action if it looks like that benefit will not be realised. This responsibility should sit at the operational level where detailed action can most easily be undertaken. The role of a Steering Committee in benefits realisation is to ensure that responsible parties are monitoring their benefits and taking appropriate corrective action.
The Department advised that it believes the Steering Committee should have responsibility for the realisation of benefits due to the difficulty of attributing the achievement of each benefit to one part of the reform alone. Given the Steering Committee meets only quarterly, it is not well placed to take action in response to variances in performance.
BOCSAR are planning to undertake an overall evaluation of EAGP which is planned for release in 2021. Undertaking this evaluation will require high quality data to gain an understanding of the drivers of the reform. However, data captured throughout the first year of EAGP has proven unreliable, which may reduce the usefulness of BOCSAR's evaluation. These data issues were discussed in Exhibit 5 in Chapter 2, above. Access to accurate data is vital for conducting any program evaluation and inaccurate data raises the risk that the BOCSAR evaluation will not be able to provide an accurate evaluation of the impact of EAGP.
In addition to the BOCSAR evaluation, the Department had plans for a series of 'snapshot' evaluations for some of the key elements of the reform to ensure that they were operating effectively. These were initially delayed due to an efficiency dividend which affected EAGP. In August 2019, the Department commissioned a review of the implementation of several key success factors for EAGP.
The implementation stage of EAGP had clear governance, lines of authority and communication. The Steering Committee, each Working Group and each agency had clear roles and responsibilities, and these were organised through a Project Management Office (PMO) provided by the former Department of Justice. The governance structure throughout the implementation phase can be seen at Exhibit 13.
The Steering Committee was established in December 2016 and met regularly from March 2017. It comprised senior members of key government agencies, as well as the Chief Judge and the Chief Magistrate for most of the duration of the implementation period. The Steering Committee met at least monthly throughout the life of the program. The Steering Committee was responsible for overseeing the delivery of EAGP and making key decisions relating to implementation, including spending decisions. The Chief Judge and the Chief Magistrate abstained from financial decisions. The Steering Committee updated the governance and membership of the Steering Committee as appropriate throughout the life of the reform.
Appendix one – Response from agency
Appendix two – About the audit
Appendix three – Performance auditing
Copyright Notice
© Copyright reserved by the Audit Office of New South Wales. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without prior consent of the Audit Office of New South Wales. The Audit Office does not accept responsibility for loss or damage suffered by any person acting on or refraining from action as a result of any of this material.
Parliamentary Reference: Report number #329 - released 18 December 2019
Actions for Contracting non-government organisations
Contracting non-government organisations
This report found the Department of Family and Community Services (FACS) needs to do more to demonstrate it is effectively and efficiently contracting NGOs to deliver community services in the Permanency Support Program (a component of out-of-home-care services) and Specialist Homelessness Services. It notes that FACS is moving to an outcomes-based commissioning model and recommends this be escalated consistent with government policy.
Government agencies, such as the Department of Family and Community Services (FACS), are increasingly contracting non-government organisations (NGOs) to deliver human services in New South Wales. In doing so, agencies are responsible for ensuring these services are achieving expected outcomes. Since the introduction of the Commissioning and Contestability Policy in 2016, all NSW Government agencies are expected to include plans for customer and community outcomes and look for ways to use contestability to raise standards.
Two of the areas receiving the greatest funding from FACS are the Permanency Support Program and Specialist Homelessness Services. In the financial year 2017–18, nearly 500 organisations received $784 million for out-of-home care programs, including the Permanency Support Program. Across New South Wales, specialist homelessness providers assist more than 54,000 people each year and in the financial year 2017–18, 145 organisations received $243 million for providing short term accommodation and homelessness support, including Specialist Homelessness Services.
In the financial year 2017–18, FACS entered into 230 contracts for out-of-home care, of which 49 were for the Permanency Support Program, representing $322 million. FACS also entered into 157 contracts for the provision of Specialist Homelessness Services which totalled $170 million. We reviewed the Permanency Support Program and Specialist Homelessness Services for this audit.
This audit assessed how effectively and efficiently FACS contracts NGOs to deliver community services. The audit could not assess how NGOs used the funds they received from FACS as the Audit Office does not have a mandate that could provide direct assurance that NGOs are using government funds effectively.
Conclusion
FACS cannot demonstrate it is effectively and efficiently contracting NGOs to deliver community services because it does not always use open tenders to test the market when contracting NGOs, and does not collect adequate performance data to ensure safe and quality services are being provided. While there are some valid reasons for using restricted tenders, it means that new service providers are excluded from consideration - limiting contestability. In the service delivery areas we assessed, FACS does not measure client outcomes as it has not yet moved to outcomes-based contracts. FACS' procurement approach sometimes restricts the selection of NGOs for the Permanency Support Program and Specialist Homelessness Services
FACS has a procurement policy and plan which it follows when contracting NGOs for the provision of human services. This includes the option to use restricted tenders, which FACS sometimes uses rather than opening the process to the market. The use of restricted tenders is consistent with its procurement plan where there is a limited number of possible providers and the services are highly specialised. However, this approach perpetuates existing arrangements and makes it very difficult for new service providers to enter the market. The recontracting of existing providers means FACS may miss the opportunity to benchmark existing providers against the whole market. FACS does not effectively use client data to monitor the performance of NGOs funded under the Permanency Support Program and Specialist Homelessness Services
FACS' contract management staff monitor individual NGO performance including safety, quality of services and compliance with contract requirements. Although FACS does provide training materials on its intranet, FACS does not provide these staff with sufficient training, support or guidance to monitor NGO performance efficiently or effectively. FACS also requires NGOs to self-report their financial performance and contract compliance annually. FACS verifies the accuracy of the financial data but conducts limited validation of client data reported by NGOs to verify its accuracy. Instead, FACS relies on contract management staff to identify errors or inaccurate reporting by NGOs. FACS' ongoing monitoring of the performance of providers under the Permanency Support Program is particularly limited due to problems with timely data collection at the program level. This reduces FACS' ability to monitor and analyse NGO performance at the program level as it does not have access to ongoing performance data for monitoring service quality. In the Specialist Homelessness Services program, FACS and NGOs both provide the data required for the National Minimum Data Set on homelessness and provide it to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, as they are required to do. However, this data is not used for NGO performance monitoring or management. FACS does not yet track outcomes for clients of NGOs
FACS began to develop an approach to outcomes-based contracting in 2015. Despite this, none of the contracts we reviewed are using outcomes as a measure of success. Currently, NGOs are required to demonstrate their performance is consistent with the measures stipulated in their contracts as part of an annual check of their contract compliance and financial accounts. NGOs report against activity-based measures (Key Performance Indicators) and not outcomes. FACS advises that the transition to outcomes-based contracting will be made with the new rounds of funding which will take place in 2020–2021 for Specialist Homelessness Services and 2023 for the Permanency Support Program. Once these contracts are in place, FACS can transition NGOs to outcomes based reporting. Incomplete data limits FACS' effectiveness in continuous improvement for the Permanency Support Program and Specialist Homelessness Services
FACS has policies and procedures in place to learn from past experiences and use this to inform future contracting decisions. However, FACS has limited client data related to the Permanency Support Program which restricts the amount of continuous improvement it can undertake. In the Specialist Homelessness Support Program data is collected to inform routine contract management discussions with service providers but FACS is not using this data for continuous improvement. |
Appendix one – Response from agency
Appendix two – About the audit
Appendix three – Performance auditing
Parliamentary Reference: Report number #323 - released 26 June 2019
Copyright reserved by the Audit Office of New South Wales. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without prior consent of the Audit Office of New South Wales. The Audit Office does not accept responsibility for loss or damage suffered by any person acting on or refraining from action as a result of any of this material.
Actions for Governance of Local Health Districts
Governance of Local Health Districts
The main roles, responsibilities and relationships between Local Health Districts (LHDs), their Boards and the Ministry of Health are clear and understood, according to a report released today by the Auditor-General for New South Wales, Margaret Crawford. However, there are opportunities to achieve further maturity in the system of governance and the audit report recommended a series of actions to further strengthen governance arrangements.
Fifteen Local Health Districts (LHDs) are responsible for providing public hospital and related health services in NSW. LHDs are:
- established as statutory corporations under the Health Services Act 1997 to manage public hospitals and provide health services within defined geographical areas
- governed by boards of between six and 13 people appointed by the Minister for Health
- managed by a chief executive who is appointed by the board with the concurrence of the Secretary of NSW Health
- accountable for meeting commitments made in annual service agreements with the NSW Ministry of Health.
The NSW Ministry of Health (the Ministry) is the policy agency for the NSW public health system, providing regulatory functions, public health policy, as well as managing the health system, including monitoring the performance of hospitals and health services.
The current roles and responsibilities of LHDs and the Ministry, along with other agencies in NSW Health, were established in 2011 following a series of reforms to the structure and governance of the system. These reforms began with the report of the 'Special Commission of Inquiry into Acute Care Services in NSW Public Hospitals' ('the Garling Inquiry'), which was released in 2008, and were followed by reforms announced by the incoming coalition government in 2011.
These reforms were intended to deliver greater local decision making, including better engagement with clinicians, consumers, local communities, and other stakeholders in the primary care (such as general practitioners) and non-government sectors.
The reforms empowered LHDs by devolving some management and accountability from the Ministry for the delivery of health services in their area. LHDs were made accountable for meeting annual obligations under service agreements.
This audit assessed the efficiency and effectiveness of the governance arrangements for LHDs. We answered two questions:
- Are there clear roles, responsibilities and relationships between the Ministry of Health and LHDs and within LHDs?
- Does the NSW Health Performance Framework establish and maintain accountability, oversight and strategic guidance for LHDs?
- continued progress in moving toward patient experience, outcome, and quality and safety measures
- improving the Health Performance Framework document to ensure it is comprehensive, clear and specifies decision makers
- greater clarity in the nexus between underperformance and escalation decisions
- including governance-related performance measures
- more rigour in accountability for non-service activity functions, including consumer and community engagement
- ensuring that performance monitoring and intervention is consistent with the intent of devolution.
NSW Health is large and complex system, operating in a dynamic environment. The governance reforms introduced in 2011 were significant and it is reasonable that they take time to mature.
The main roles of LHDs and the Ministry are clear and well-understood, and there is good collaboration between different parts of the system. This provides a sound foundation on which to further mature the governance arrangements of LHDs.
While the broad roles of LHDs, their boards, and the Ministry are well understood by stakeholders in the system, there are matters of detail and complexity that create ambiguity and uncertainty, including:
- the roles and relationships between the LHDs and the Pillars
- to what extent LHDs have discretion to pursue innovation
- individual responsibility and obligations between chairs, boards, executive staff, and the Ministry.
These should be addressed collaboratively between boards, their executives, and the Ministry, and should be informed by a statement of principles that guides how devolved decision making should be implemented.
Better clinician engagement in health service decision making was a key policy driver for devolution. Priority should be given by LHDs and the Ministry to ensuring that clinicians are adequately engaged in LHD decision making. It appears that in many cases they are not, and this needs to be addressed.
The quality of board decision making depends on the information they are provided and their capacity to absorb and analyse that information. More can be done to promote good decision making by improving the papers that go to boards, and by ensuring that board members are well positioned to absorb the information provided. This includes ensuring that the right type and volume of information are provided to boards, and that members and executive managers have adequate data literacy skills to understand the information.
Recommendations
- By December 2019, the Ministry of Health should:
- work with LHDs to identify and overcome barriers that are limiting the appropriate engagement of clinicians in decision making in LHDs
- develop a statement of principles to guide decision making in a devolved system
- provide clarity on the relationship of the Agency for Clinical Innovation and the Clinical Excellence Commission to the roles and responsibilities of LHDs.
- By June 2020, LHDs boards, supported where appropriate by the Ministry of Health, should address the findings of this performance audit to ensure that local practices and processes support good governance, including:
- providing timely and consistent induction; training; and reviews of boards, members and charters
- ensuring that each board's governance and oversight of service agreements is consistent with their legislative functions
- improving the use of performance information to support decision making by boards and executive managers.
This cultural shift has achieved greater recognition of the importance of transparency in how well LHDs perform. However, as NSW Health is a large, complex and dynamic system, it is important that these accountability and oversight mechanisms continue to evolve to ensure that they are sufficiently robust to support good governance.
There are areas where accountability and oversight can be improved including:
- continued progress in moving toward patient experience, outcome and value-based measures
- improving the Health Performance Framework document to ensure it is comprehensive, clear and specifies decision makers
- greater clarity in the nexus between underperformance and escalation decisions
- by adding governance-related performance measures to service agreements
- more rigour in accountability for non-service activity functions, such as consumer and community engagement
- ensuring that performance monitoring and intervention is consistent with the intent of devolution.
Recommendations
3. By June 2020, the Ministry of Health should improve accountability and oversight mechanisms by:
a) revising the Health Performance Framework so that it is a cohesive and comprehensive document
b) clarifying processes and decision making for managing performance concerns
c) developing a mechanism to adequately hold LHDs accountable for non-service activity functions
d) reconciling performance monitoring and intervention with the policy intent of devolution.
Appendix one - Response from agency
Appendix two - Functions of a Local Health District
Appendix three - Functions of a Local Health District Board
Appendix four - Routine performance monitoring and reporting
Appendix five - Escalation model for the NSW Health Performance Framework
Appendix six - About the audit
Appendix seven - Performance auditing
Parliamentary Reference: Report number #316 - released 18 April 2019
Actions for Cost of Alcohol Abuse to the NSW Government
Cost of Alcohol Abuse to the NSW Government
The NSW Government does not estimate or report the total cost of alcohol abuse. The Audit Office of New South Wales’ sponsored research estimates it costs the government over $1 billion a year, or around $416 from each NSW household.
Parliamentary reference - Report number #235 - released 6 August 2013
Actions for Making the Best Use of Public Housing
Making the Best Use of Public Housing
There are 55,000 eligible applicants on the social housing waiting list, with some people waiting for more than ten years to get a house. The waiting list could be more than 86,000 by 2016 unless things change.
Social housing only meets about 44 per cent of need in New South Wales even though we have the largest social housing portfolio in Australia. Social housing falls into three groups. About 80 per cent is public housing which is owned and operated by government. The remaining stock is community housing and Aboriginal housing.
Parliamentary reference - Report number #234 - released 30 July 2013
Actions for Building Energy Use in NSW Public Hospitals
Building Energy Use in NSW Public Hospitals
NSW Health has reduced its energy use and greenhouse gas emissions by two per cent over the last four years. It is pleasing that annual emissions are now 15,000 tonnes less than they were four years ago. However, this was not sufficient to meet its target of an 11 per cent drop in emissions.
Despite a reduction in energy use, energy cost in NSW Health has increased by nearly 50 per cent over the last four years to $120 million per annum. This is expected to increase by another 50 per cent in the next five years.
Parliamentary reference - Report number #231 - released 4 June 2013
Actions for Ambulance Service of NSW: Readiness to respond
Ambulance Service of NSW: Readiness to respond
This performance audit indicates that the Service has considerable work to do to reach its aspirations of being recognised amongst leading examples of best practice services. The commitment of the Service to serving the community and the professionalism of the Service's officers is not in question. It is, however, apparent that a number of barriers to performance will need to be overcome for the Service to perform as well as it would wish.
Parliamentary reference - Report number #80 - released 7 March 2001
Actions for Group homes for people with disabilities
Group homes for people with disabilities
The Audit Office acknowledges that this is an extremely complex and difficult area of Government activity and that putting in place effective systems is a significant challenge. Nevertheless, it is a critical task, given the vulnerability of clients and the scarcity of resources. Whilst there has been progress in improving systems, and further enhancements are planned, nevertheless, five years after the creation of the Ageing and Disability Department as the industry regulator, there are a number of fundamental issues which remain to be resolved.
The Audit Office is of the opinion that significant further development of performance information systems is required before there can be an adequate level of assurance that Government funding is provided in conformity with the Disability Services Act 1993 and that services provided represent value for money.
Parliamentary reference - Report number #74 - released 27 June 2000