The 2016 Corruption Perceptions Index, released Wednesday by Transparency International, has given Australia a score of 79 out of 100, on a scale ranging from 'highly corrupt' to 'very clean'.

The score was the result of a compilation of 13 international data sources, surveys and reports which specialised in governance and business climate analysis, such as The World Bank Country Policy and Institutional Assessment 2015.

The score matched last year's result, but signalled a decline on previous years, including 80 in 2014 and 85 in 2012.

Professor AJ Brown from Transparency International Australia said the data which led to the score was compiled before the most recent parliamentary entitlements scandal that led to former Minister Sussan Ley's resignation, which he said would have "probably had an impact".

"So with this in mind, there is reason to be concerned that Australia isn't dealing with corruption as well as it should be, confidence in that remains ambivalent to where it should be, or where we would like it to be," he told SBS News.

"So the big question now is what are we going to do about it?"

He said the score offered an opportunity for the public sector to look deeper into the issue of corruption.

"The big question was whether we were going to continue our slump over the past few years or turn it around in terms of perceptions about how corrupt the government is in Australia.

"The fact that we have ended up plateauing and staying where we were last year gives us a little breathing space to figure out how we were going to turn it around."

Professor Brown said his organisation had sent the findings to the federal government and they are working on methods to deal with the issues.

Transparency Australia will host a National Integrity conference in March where there will be representatives from the public and private sectors.



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How other countries fared

Denmark and New Zealand topped this year's index of countries perceived as being clean, with scores of 90, closely followed by Finland, 89, Sweden, 88, and Switzerland, 86.

The UK came in equal 10th position with a score of 81, while US placed 18th with a score of 74.

The countries that fared worse were Somalia, 10, South Sudan, 11, North Korea, 12, and Syria, 13.

Professor Brown said a concern for Australia was that trading partners in south-east Asia had scored lower than in previous years.

"The fact that quit a few of the Asia-Pacific countries which we have strong relationships with decreased on the index, is something that Australia has really got to watch," he said.

"Thailand, Korea, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore have all gone down by at least one point. This really confirmed that we live, work and trade in an environment where we can't afford to be complacent in terms of our exposure to corruption pressures."