Review of Commonwealth Government Business Enterprises ...

3.3 Statement of Corporate Intent (SCI)
3.3.1 A SCI is prepared in conjunction with a GBE’s corporate plan each year and tabled in the
Parliament. The SCI is a forward looking document, which is designed to provide the
Parliament with a high level summary of the GBE’s objectives, accountability regime and
broad performance expectations for the period covered by the SCI.
3.3.2 While the SCI is necessarily prepared at a high level to prevent the disclosure of
commercially sensitive information that might damage the GBE’s competitive position,
the SCI plays an important role in providing the Parliament and the public with information
about the GBE’s prospective activities.
3.3.3 When read alongside the GBE’s annual report, the SCI provides a more complete picture of
the GBE’s objectives and achievements during the year. However, given its forward-looking
nature, the SCI is not designed to be the primary document upon which the Parliament
assesses GBE performance, rather the annual report fulfls this function.
3.3.4 Finance proposes that the SCI’s role could be further enhanced through two
additional measures.
3.3.5 Firstly, while SCI’s are tabled in the Parliament, their accessibility to the public could be
enhanced by requiring publication on GBE websites. Websites have, in recent years,
become a major point through which the public accesses information (such as annual
reports) on private sector and government entities. Most GBEs already publish their SCI
on their website, and Finance considers it is appropriate to formalise this as a requirement
in the GBE Guidelines. 28
3.3.6 Secondly, accountability to the Parliament could be enhanced through GBE annual reports
including reporting of achievements against SCI expectations of performance.
3.3.7 While some level of reporting of performance against corporate plan objectives is currently
required of Commonwealth authority GBEs in their Report of Operations, 29 no equivalent
reporting requirements currently exist for Commonwealth companies through the director’s
report required by the Corporations Act. 30
3.3.8 Reporting against SCI objectives would assist interested stakeholders in following the
achievements of specifc GBE objectives from the time they are set, through to when
outcomes are achieved. This change was also recommended by the OECD in its Corporate
Governance Guidelines 31 and the Australian National Audit Offce in its report Agencies’
Performance Monitoring of Commonwealth Government Business Enterprises. 32
Exposure Draft
28 http://www.comu.govt.nz/resources/pdfs/oem-soe-07.pdf
29 Clause 10(1) of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies (Report of Operations) Orders 2005.
http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/Legislation/ActCompilation1.nsf/0/D01E012B7D5A01A3CA256FC3007EE1EF/$fle/CwlthAuthCompanies1997_WD02.pdf
Note that these Orders do not currently apply to companies registered under the Corporations Act 2001.
30
Annual reporting by companies registered under the Corporations Act 2001, including Commonwealth companies, is covered by Part 2M.3 of the
Corporations Act 2001.
31 OECD Guidelines on Corporate Governance of State-Owned Enterprises 2005, page 42 www.oecd.org/daf/corporateaffairs/soe/guidelines
32 http://www.anao.gov.au/director/publications/auditreports/2000-2001.cfm?pageNumber=4 Australian National Audit Offce, Report No. 15, 2000-2001,
Agencies’ Performance Monitoring of Commonwealth Government Business Enterprises p69.
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