Chief Minister Andrew Barr says problems within EventsACT that enabled staff to hand out more than $1.4 million worth of work without following the proper processes have been addressed with the restructure of the organisation.
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Documents obtained by The Canberra Times under freedom of information laws reveal EventsACT staff signed $550,000 worth of contracts without the correct authority.
Staff also gave out nearly $700,000 of work without a contract and failed to get the minimum three quotes for around $160,000 worth of work.
The alleged breaches of procurement laws were uncovered during an audit of the 2017 Floriade festival, which went $1.2 million over budget in part due to the issues with financial management in the organisations.
There is no suggestion any of the suppliers were aware of any procurement or authorisation problems.
The Canberra Liberals' spokesman for tourism Andrew Wall said the breaches warranted a system-wide inquiry into the government’s procurement processes.
However Mr Barr said the "big problems" with EventsACT's procurement for past events had been corrected, and those responsible had been held accountable.
“Most of the senior staff at EventsACT no longer work at EventsACT so yes there has been accountability for those who were responsible for going over the budget and not meeting the government's procurement requirements," Mr Barr said.
"We have also outsourced significant elements of the running of these events now and that ensures a greater degree of financial management control, clearly because a lot more of that expenditure and commercial relationship sits outside government."
Mr Barr later told Canberra radio station 2CC the events division had their "financial delegations wound back" as part of the restructure.
He said he believed the issues related to multi-year contracts and how often they should be put back on the market for an event like Floriade.
Ultimately, Mr Barr said the problems with last year's festival resulted in a better event this year.
"People will have noticed this year it’s no longer a catered event, the food and beverage focus has moved to a more foodie gourmet experience rather than a canteen style catered process and that’s one of the changes that come into fruition," Mr Barr said.
A spokeswoman said the ACT government was not aware of similar cases in other directorates, but was looking at how audit, compliance and education could be stepped up to ensure all procurement complied with the law.
