Australian Government to Mend 'Cosy' Agency Ways

The Australian Federal Government is to shake up the way it selects ad agencies and market research companies, reports the Sydney Morning Herald. Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner promised an end to the 'closed shop' operated under the previous government.

The paper, online at www.smh.com.au , says a new roster - or 'multi-use list' in official parlance - will be ready by mid-February, for the first time showing provider companies. Mr Tanner, whose department oversees the Government's ad budget, said the new list is a 'clean slate'. The tender for the list closed today.

Tanner was careful in his criticism of the previous regime, commenting: 'The previous government's arrangements were highly opaque and there [were] a lot of complaints in the industry about favouritism... When you have opaque arrangements you are always going to get those complaints, whether or not they are true.' Suppliers, he added, had got into a 'cosy little groove' with officials who did not ask the question 'Could be we do this better with someone else?'

The list will be regularly updated, says Tanner, and those companies already working for government departments will have to reapply, although regular suppliers of the previous regime will not be discriminated against.

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.