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22.Public officers with certain delegated powers, such as the authority to award a contract, a financial delegation or the power to employ a person (or officers involved in such activities6), should be subject to additional conflict of interest disclosure and declaration requirements, as these
are significant areas of risk for conflicts of interest. While many public sector agencies have some additional requirements in place, I continue to identify instances where public officers involved in procurement7
or recruitment have failed to identify, declare, avoid and manage clear conflicts of interest.
23.This section provides a representative sample of such cases, and highlights the consequences of failures to identify, disclose and manage conflicts of interest. These cases are divided into conflicts arising from private business interests and personal relationships, as these are two of the most common types of conflict of interest cases investigated by my office.
Private business interests
24.Private business interests represent one of the most obvious types of conflict of interest, particularly in the context of procurement. The vulnerability of this area of public sector activity to conflict of interest was highlighted in my 2008 report Conflict of interest in the public sector8, yet my office continues to regularly see cases where these conflict of interest issues are not handled appropriately.
25.The following case study illustrates the clear conflicts of interest private business interests can create, which in this case were not identified, declared or avoided by the public officer.
Case study 1 – Statutory body employee’s engagement of his own company
During my 2013 investigation in relation to the conduct of a senior employee of a statutory body, I found that the employee:
•had been a director and shareholder of a private company for over
10 years;
•had engaged the company on behalf of the statutory body to provide services over a six year period;
•had personally approved payments to the company totalling several hundreds of thousands of dollars;
•had failed to declare his association to his supervisors who were unaware of his involvement in the company until my investigation; and
•conducted research on behalf of the statutory body to evaluate the effectiveness of work completed by the company, in which he had a financial interest.
6For example, one officer may have the delegation to award a contract however other officers may also be involved in the tender process.
7Including activities such as obtaining and evaluating quotes, sitting on tender evaluation panels, awarding contracts and contract management.
8Victorian Ombudsman, Conflict of interest in the public sector, March 2008, page 22.