Department says Scott Morrison-ordered review has been completed but it has not been publicly released

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The home affairs department is keeping a multimillion-dollar strategic review into Peter Dutton’s super portfolio secret from the public.

The review was ordered just five months after the creation of the home affairs department in late 2017, which saw the former department of immigration and border protection expanded with agencies and responsibilities from within the attorney general’s department, as well as elements of regional development, social services and prime minister and cabinet.

The then treasurer, Scott Morrison, set aside $7m in the 2018 budget for a “strategic review” of the portfolio, with the aim of identifying “integrating capabilities, reducing duplication and maximising efficiencies” within the super department, which was modelled on the UK home affairs office.

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The review was to be finalised by May this year.

A spokeswoman for the department said the review was completed but the report was not publicly released. Asked if the department planned on releasing the details of the report, the spokeswoman said: “We have nothing further to add.”

In the months since the report was due, the Sydney Morning Herald and Age newspapers have reported budget cuts within Dutton’s department, including to the Australian Border Force.

Dutton has not explained the cuts, except to say it would not affect operations.

But the secretive nature of the strategic review into what is rapidly becoming one of the nation’s most secretive departments has attracted the ire of the shadow home affairs minister, Kristina Keneally.

“A review of such strategic importance should be released to reassure the community that the department overseeing Australia’s national security, border protection and immigration is operating as required,” she said.

“Given the department and Mr Dutton’s record of waste, mismanagement and maladministration, the release of the report is especially important.

“The Australian taxpayer deserves to know who undertook the review, how long ago it was completed, what the review found and, ultimately, how $7m of their money was spent.

“If Mr Dutton does not release the report of the strategic review, the $7m spent on it adds to the home affairs minister’s track record of waste including a $300m budget blowout in one financial quarter and $423m in contracts granted to a company run out of a beach shack on Kangaroo Island.”

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Late last month, home affairs announced it was extending the controversial Paladin contract to run services on Manus Island but would work with Papua New Guinea towards transitioning the contracts. The Paladin contact has so far worked out to at least $1,600 a day for each asylum seeker and refugee but does not include food or medical care.

Home affairs has also confirmed it is moving ahead with a visa processing privatisation plan in a contract expected to be worth at least $1bn. The head of the department, Mike Pezzullo, told a Senate estimates hearing in April, ahead of the May election, the tender process included the caveat a future government may not move forward with the tender but, with the Coalition’s May election win, that looks all but guaranteed.

“The government is not privatising the visa system or outsourcing responsibility for visa decision making,” a home affairs spokeswoman said. “As set out in the tender documentation on the department’s website, the government will always retain responsibility and accountability for sovereign functions including immigration policy, visa decision making and security checks.

“The procurement process remains underway, it would be inappropriate to comment further.”