The investigation and subsequent reports were completed by Deloitte under a process that was subsequently found to be inadequate and as a consequence NZTA no longer stands by the findings of those reports — which have been removed from NZTA’s website. NZTA has also apologised to the manager who was the subject of the reports.
The Transport Agency has refused to release an inquiry report into potential conflicts of interest over high-tech app contracts.
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This latest inquiry focused on procurement processes, contracts and potential conflicts of interest around a fleet management app and related apps put out by another agency unit.
"These findings and any recommendations will be reviewed and fully addressed, and the report will be published in due course," the agency told RNZ last July.
But now the Transport Agency is refusing an RNZ request to release them.
It cited a section of the Official Information Act that provides a conclusive reason for "withholding information if the making of the information available would prejudice the maintenance of the law, including the prevention, investigation, and detection of offences, and the right to a fair trial".
As a result, it remains unclear what the inquiry found about what went wrong at the agency's two key units, if any recommendations have been made, and if the Transport Agency has now addressed these.
There was significant taxpayer investment in failed or problematic tech initiatives at the agency.
Pre-use, a vehicle fleet management app released in 2015, was one of these projects. The Transport Agency has refused to provide details about it for a year.
The mismanagement of tech projects at the Transport Agency came to a head early last year when the agency was forced to disband a business unit. The unit had been resisting the usual public sector oversight.
It was found to have 40 projects on the go, all funded only for the short-term and with no work plan, and with a lot of the work outsourced to contractors, thereby eroding the agency's own internal knowledge and intellectual property, governance minutes show.
