Ministers make appointments to powerful roles across the public sector. These can be controversial, so ensuring a high calibre of appointees is important. This report responds to concerns about the appointments process – and standards in public life generally – by proposing reforms to restore...

The objective of the audit was to assess whether the award of funding under the Building Better Regions Fund was effective as well as being consistent with the Commonwealth Grant Rules and Guidelines.

This guest paper reveals patterns in ministerial leadership styles that have profound impacts on the relationship between ministers and civil servants. The paper identifies two distinct styles of ministerial management and leadership of civil servants – and finds evidence that male and female ministers adopt...

This document has been prepared in light of a recognition that public office is a public trust, and therefore, the people of Australia are entitled to expect that, as a matter of principle, government ministers will act with due regard for integrity, fairness, accountability, responsibility...

This report argues that the experience of the carbon capture and storage (CCS) method development raises serious questions about the governance of both the Clean Energy Regulator and the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee, in relation to the development and integrity of forthcoming Emissions Reduction Fund...

This report looks at the increasing use of WhatsApp and other messaging apps in government, and their associated risks and benefits. These apps are useful but need to be used carefully to ensure the downsides – including a lack of transparency, poor communication and poor...

This paper argues that Boris Johnson should take the steps to establish and enforce the high standards the public expects of the UK government and to help restore trust in public life.

State capture occurs when powerful or wealthy interests interfere with decision-making and assume a degree of control over the democratic rule-making process itself. This report breaks down six modes of influence used in State capture.

Scott Morrison says Richard Colbeck has appeared before the Senate Select Committee on COVID-19 'many, many times'. Verdict: Mr Morrison's claim is wrong.

This report explores how the powerful fossil fuel, gambling and tobacco industries are attempting to take advantage of Australia’s weak integrity laws, thereby distorting the nation's democratic processes, to put profits ahead of society's wellbeing.

This analysis, from the Australia Institute’s Democracy and Accountability Program, reveals that $3.9 billion spent by federal grants programs with ministerial discretion has clearly favoured marginal Coalition seats in particular, at the expense of safe Labor seats and, to a lesser extent, safe Coalition seats.

Repeated controversies over ministerial behaviour and failures in the process of investigating possible breaches of the ministerial code show that the ministerial code, in its current form, is no longer working. This paper offers recommendations on how Boris Johnson should overhaul the ministerial code to...

In his seven hours of testimony to a House of Commons committee, the UK Prime Minister’s former chief adviser, Dominic Cummings, laid out a portrait of a chaotic government failing in its basic functions. This report sets out some recommendations for what the UK government...

This inquiry was initiated following evidence that Senator Bridget McKenzie, the former Federal Sports Minister, had intervened in grant allocation decisions regarding the Community Sport Infrastructure Grant program in order to gain political advantage for Coalition candidates and members in the 2019 federal election.

The second wave of COVID-19 cases in Victoria led to a series of strict restrictions in the state and had devastating impacts on peoples’ lives, livelihoods and mental health. This inquiry final report finds that there were serious failings, in terms of provision of pandemic...

This interim report identifies issues that have emerged from the COVID-19 Hotel Quarantine Board of Inquiry to date, and makes recommendations for a quarantine program in Victoria, as the state begins to consider re-opening to international arrivals.

The Cabinet Handbook is designed to ensure that the federal Cabinet observes conventions and principles, and fulfils its central purpose of informed decision-making.

In 2017, the Commonwealth Department of Agriculture and Water Resources paid almost $80 million for water rights in the Condamine-Balonne valley. This research is based on unredacted valuation documents about the ‘Watergate’ scandal.

The practice of moving detainees around Australia’s immigration detention network is doubly unjustifiable on economic and humanitarian grounds

Politically motivated funding decisions are dwarfing the controversy that claimed a minister.