The Federal Court of Australia spent more than $34,000 over two years on bottle shops, including nearly $13,000 at Dan Murphy’s, for judges’ events, ceremonies and other functions, using taxpayer-funded credit cards, government audit records reveal.
The court, which spent more than $6000 over three occasions at one Bondi cellars alone, is one of three federal agencies marked down by the Australian National Audit Office over their corporate card use, along with the influential Productivity Commission and the agency overseeing the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
The Federal Court spent more than $34,000 at bottle shops over a two-year period.Credit: Louie Douvis
The audit released this week found the court spent $13,673 in the financial year 2021-22, and $20,609 in 2022-23, but had no documented pre-approval for the vast majority of sampled transactions, even though the court’s own rules say pre-approval must be recorded as soon as possible.
“The FCA’s [Accountable Authority Instructions] state that decisions to spend money on official hospitality must be publicly defensible,” the report said, detailing one episode in which a cardholder made three transactions at Dan Murphy’s in the one day which, combined, exceeded the $1000 limit for a single purchase.
The report marked the court as “partly effective” in its handling of corporate credit cards in line with internal policies.
“There were weaknesses in its preventive controls relating to assessing and recording business needs for issuing credit cards and documenting pre-approval and rationales for purchases,” it said.
The organisation running the NDIS is another government agency faulted for its use of corporate credit cards.Credit: James Charisiou
While the Australian National Audit Office found the various bodies’ standards surrounding the use record-keeping of corporate cards needed improvement, it did not find the spending was fraudulent.
A court spokesperson said: “The amounts reported relate to all relevant expenditure across the entire listed non-corporate entity. This expenditure was consistent with the entity’s Official Hospitality and Entertainment Policy.”
The court agreed with the auditor’s recommendations, including confirming documented pre-approval for spending on hospitality and entertainment.
As part of a series of reports, the audit office also assessed the effectiveness of policies around corporate card spending for the National Disability Insurance Agency, and the Productivity Commission, the independent statutory authority that conducts economic research and issues advice.
The audit office said it was undertaking the audits because credit card misuse could cause reputational damage to the public service.
“Deliberate misuse of a corporate credit card is fraud,” it said, adding credit cards were a common fraud risk for the Commonwealth.
The auditor noted that taxi cards issued to Productivity Commission staff were misused on Spotify, Uber Eats and Woolworths, and that monitoring and reporting on credit card use was irregular, despite more than $700,000 spent on travel and accommodation in the previous financial year.
The audit office recommended the commission ensure corporate cards were used only for their defined purposes, in a list of accepted recommendations.
The office recorded eight instances of the National Disability Insurance Agency staff flying business class without authorisation between 2021 and 2023, and recommended a range of measures to safeguard credit card use.
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