‘Blows my mind’: KPMG’s whistleblower issues collide
A top consultancy whose Australian boss resigned over the treatment of a whistleblower hosted whistleblower support services for some of the country’s biggest companies.
The revelation came to light during a federal parliamentary joint committee chaired by Labor senator Deborah O’Neill examining the activities of the corporate regulator.
Senator O’Neill told a hearing in Canberra on Friday that he had come across the National Australia Bank’s Whistleblower Protection Policy from April this year.
The policy directs potential whistleblowers to KPMG’s Fair Call Service, which is described as “independently monitored external helpline and reporting services”.
The evidence came as KPMG, one of the Big Four accounting firms, announced on Friday that its Australia chairman, Andrew Yates, had resigned, along with head of audit Julian McPherson.
They took responsibility for the treatment of and mishandling of allegations by a whistleblower, after an internal investigation into allegations of misconduct found that the firm did not meet its expectations.
“I am committed to a culture of speaking out at our firm, it is clear we have let ourselves down in this situation and I take responsibility,” Mr Yates said in a statement.
The ongoing internal investigation also uncovered a separate incident in which documents containing customer information were improperly shared internally.
There were also allegations of inappropriate disclosure regarding the sharing of customer information in a team environment.
Asked whether the corporate regulator would investigate, Australian Securities and Investments Commission deputy chair Sarah Court said it would.
“We are very interested,” he told the joint committee on companies and financial services.
Senator O’Neill said he was aware that NAB was not the only company using KPMG’s service.
“Some of the most important companies in this country appear to be using this service, which gives me pause,” he said at the hearing.
“Who initiated Fair Call KPMG whistleblowing services? Which companies were involved?”
“I can say that a bit of research so far has revealed that the RBA (Reserve Bank of Australia) and the ASX (Australian Securities Exchange) are actually using this tipping service, which surprises me.”
ASIC also confirmed on Friday that it had launched a preliminary investigation into the conduct of at least three KPMG registered company auditors.
The investigation comes amid allegations that auditors working on a Lendlease matter hid and used access to audit tender images in the construction company’s board documents to “inform” Westpac’s tenders for audit work.
Commissioner Kate O’Rourke emphasized that the investigation was about the auditors rather than the company.
“We initiated these investigations following a meeting with KPMG on 14 April, and then after receiving further anonymised information in writing from KPMG on 29 April,” he added.
Regarding KPMG’s own investigation, Ms Court said the regulator had made a number of submissions to KPMG for the production of information.
Australia’s Associated Press is the beating heart of Australian news. AAP is Australia’s only independent national news channel and has been providing accurate, reliable and fast-paced news content to the media industry, government and corporate sector for 85 years. We inform Australia.
