Scyne Advisory slashes 90 jobs as government consultancy spending cut in half

Government consulting firm Scyne Advisory will sack 90 staff on top of the 78 who lost their jobs last year.

Scyne Advisory managing director Richard Gwilym.

Consulting firm Scyne Advisory will sack 90 staff in response to a market slump, after the federal government revealed it had nearly halved the value of contracts awarded to the big four firms.

Scyne told staff on Thursday it would eliminate 90 roles, including 10 managing directors – the equivalent of partners in the firm.

Scyne Advisory is the former government consulting business of audit and consulting giant PwC Australia which was sold to Allegro Funds for just $1 last year after revelations about PwC’s misuse of confidential tax information.

The cuts will affect Scyne’s footprint in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra in response to reduce spending on consultants by the governments of NSW and Victoria and the federal government.

In an email to staff, Scyne chief executive Richard Gwilym said the company had spent the last nine months “stabilising the business” but had been forced to make the cuts after a tightening of government expenditure.

“Our initial objective was stabilisation, but we are now shifting to a more focused strategy, prioritising areas where we believe we can have the greatest impact,” Mr Gwilym said.

“This has resulted in the need to make some changes to our business to create the capacity for increased investment in areas of identified strategic importance.”

The cuts come as government spending on consultants dwindles.

Scyne has secured almost $200m in revenue from the almost $600m previously collected by PwC’s public sector consulting arm.

In March the Albanese government warned it was targeting a further $1bn in cost savings on consulting spending.

This was in addition to an earlier $3bn in savings banked in prior budgets.

On Thursday the government also revealed spending on the big four consulting firms had plummeted to just over $516m. This takes federal government consulting expenditure back to levels recorded in 2021-22. The government is also pushing forward with an in-house consulting firm, aimed at filling the space previously occupied by the big four.

Senator Katy Gallagher said Thursday was “no doubt a tough day” for Scyne employees.

“Our government has always been clear that a strong and empowered public service will deliver better outcomes, at a lower cost, to Australian taxpayers,” she said. But Senator Gallagher said the government’s data was showing the results of its efforts to target consulting spending.

“We have been upfront that there will always be a certain role for consultants and those with specialist expertise to help governments achieve their agenda,” she said.

“But our priority is reducing our overreliance on this shadow workforce, delivering billions of dollars in savings for the budget, and restoring the APS’s capacity to serve the Australian people.”

Meanwhile, a parliamentary committee has summoned a number of current and former PwC staff to appear next week.

They include PwC chief executive Kevin Burrowes and former firm bosses Tom Seymour and Luke Sayers.

In addition the architect of PwC’s legal response to the tax scandal, former general counselMeredith Beattie, has been summoned alongside chief risk & ethics leader Jan McCahey and the firm’s current general counsel Kylie Gray.

PwC international board member Paddy Carney and global chair Mohamed Kande are also expected to appear.

In addition, former Telstra boss Ziggy Switkowski, the author of a review of PwC, has been called to appear before the parliamentary joint committee on corporations and financial services on August 2.

Labor senator Deborah O’Neill said that it was time for “PwC to stop its half-truths and obfuscation and tell the full story to the Australian people”.

“While the past leaders of PwC such as Tom Seymour and Luke Sayers may consider the matter to be resolved, their actions warrant further scrutiny.

“They must be completely answerable to this committee,“ she said.

“Through PwC’s monetisation of confidential government information and deception of the ATO and the Foreign Investment Review Board, a culture of contempt for the Australian taxpayer has emerged.”