Annual Report 2005–06
Management of financial resources
Purchasing
All goods and services were purchased in accordance with the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997, the Commonwealth Procurement Guidelines and the Clerk’s Instructions.
The department took up a provision in the DPS stationery supply arrangements with Corporate Express for its stationery supplies. The DPS tender provided for the chamber departments to join the arrangements negotiated, and this represented best value for money.
The department regularly approached the market for paper products during 2005–06 and conducted several assessments for minor purchases in accordance with the Commonwealth Procurement Guidelines.
During the year, we conducted a select tender to replace ageing fax machines and continued our ongoing program to replace laptops, printers and scanners for senators and departmental staff.
Our procurement plan for 2005–06 foreshadowed the replacement of photocopiers. This did not happen, because reallocation of machines met immediate needs, but the department expects to replace ageing machines during 2006–07.
Assets management
In conjunction with the Information Technology and Financial Management sections, the Office Services Subsection is responsible for the effective management of Senate assets.
At 30 June 2006, the department controlled 4,619 assets with a fair value of $4.1 million (last year’s total was 4,572 assets with a fair value of $4.3 million). In 2005–06, 468 assets were added and 421 assets were written off.
The annual stocktake was completed in May 2006. On completion of the stocktake, 137 assets with a depreciated value of $42,315 had not been located. Eighteen of these assets had not been found in the previous stocktake and will be written off.
This year’s stocktake result was not as good as the previous year’s, with a failure rate of 2.3 per cent in asset numbers (1.4 per cent for 2004–05) and 1 per cent in depreciated value (0.7 per cent for 2004–05). The departure of staff from the assets management area and difficulties recruiting suitably experienced replacements resulted in transitional staffing arrangements for much of the year. This contributed to a temporary decline in the quality of assets management. Having now recruited suitable staff, we expect assets management to improve in 2006–07.