An audit report on security screening at Australian airports by the Department of Home Affairs has found little evidence the practice is effectively preventing prohibited items such as weapons and explosives being carried onto aircraft.
In his report, Domestic Passenger Screening–Follow Up, Auditor-General, Grant Hehir found that recommendations to improve the practice made by his office in a 2016 audit had been partially implemented and that the Department was “not yet well placed to provide assurance that passenger screening is effective and that screening authorities comply with the Regulations”.
Mr Hehir said the 2016 audit made five recommendations for improving the Department’s regulatory performance, all of which the Department (then the Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development) accepted.
“It was expected that the Department would act quickly to address and remediate the issues identified,” Mr Hehir said.
“The response from the Department (advised) that a number of initiatives to address the shortcomings identified were already underway.”
He said timely implementation was necessary to achieve full value from the agreed recommendations.
“On this basis, the ANAO decided to commence a follow-up audit in the 2017–18 financial year to determine if the Department is implementing the recommendations from the previous audit in a timely manner, and if the Department is now in a better position to provide assurance of the effectiveness of passenger screening.”
Mr Hehir said the second audit had found that as at March 2018, the Department had implemented one and partially implemented four of the five recommendations.
“The extent to which the Department has implemented an effective compliance monitoring program has been constrained by the quality of data captured,” the auditor said.
“Consequently, the ability of the Department to conduct meaningful analysis … is limited.”
He said the Department had further work to do to be able to identify non-compliance trends and although it had developed a learning and development framework, “the plan to implement the framework has not yet been approved”.
The auditor made a further three recommendations dealing with passenger screening; the implementation of a monitoring and evaluation strategy; and the establishment of performance measures, all of which were agreed by the Department.
The 42-page audit report can be accessed at this PS News link and the audit team was Joyce Knight, Michael Commens and Sally Ramsey.
