The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has produced an information report seeking insights on grants issued by the Department of Finance and how entities’ self-report on their grants via GrantConnect.
In a statement, the ANAO noted that GrantConnect provided centralised publication of Government grant opportunities and awards.
It said reporting back on the website had been mandated from 31 December 2017 for all non-corporate Commonwealth entities.
“It is also mandated for corporate Commonwealth entities where a Minister is involved in the decision-making,” the ANAO said.
“Section 25 of the Auditor-General Act 1997 enables the Auditor-General at any time to cause a report to be tabled in either House of the Parliament on any matter.”
It said this was the first information report prepared by the ANAO on Australian Government grants reporting.
The ANAO said 108,206 grant awards had been published on GrantConnect between 31 December 2017 and 30 June 2021.
“These were published by 31 non-corporate Commonwealth entities and two corporate Commonwealth entities with a total value of $60.2 billion,” the statement said.
“By value, most grants (42 per cent) were awarded through a closed non-competitive selection process. However, ad hoc/one-off grants were the most numerous (24 per cent).”
The ANAO’s 58-page report can be accessed online at this PS News link with a PDF at this link.
The information report team was Ben Siddans, Danielle Page, Daniel Fawcett and Xiaoyan Lu.
