Feds maintain home insulation issues were resolved, defend ministers’ role
The federal government said on Friday that ministers who handled the country's botched home insulation scheme should not take the entire blame even as a report furnished by the auditor-general declared that risk management measures were largely overlooked during the project's implementation.
The same report added that the Department of Environment failed on its crucial role to sift through numerous claims of fraud and safety issues due to its apparent intent of expediting the realisation of the national government's stimulus goals.
However, the federal government said that the report was not incriminating any ministers on the bungled initiative as parliament secretary Mark Dreyfus simply noted that "the government has learnt the lessons and we are applying them in our remediation efforts."
Education Minister Peter Garrett, who used to head the scheme's implementation, maintained that his role on the failed effort was not erratic as he expressed confidence that he merely did what was required of him at that time.
The parliament secretary admitted that the finding of the auditor-general were indeed pointing to glaring deficiencies in the administration of the program as he stressed that "these shortcomings are unacceptable to the government and we will continue our work to ensure they are addressed, and not repeated."
In reaction to the program's failure and even before the release of the report, Mr Dreyfus said that the government has already conducted more than 95,000 safety inspections as he pointed out that the auditor-general specifically mentioned that despite the mistakes, the government appeared to have learned its lessons from the disappointing episode.
He asserted that the home insulation issues that plagued the program last year was already resolved, which he said is precisely the reason why no recommendations were contained in the report since "the have been identified and acted upon."