Public servants ‘treated appallingly’
The allegations were in response to a recent submission by the APC Secretaries Board on behalf of public servants to a parliamentary standards committee. Concerns raised included examples of behaviour that went beyond “robust discussion, accountability, and free-flowing questioning that you would have in a Senate committee”, said Australian Public Service Commissioner Jacqui Curtis.
The intention of the submission was to bring attention to “circumstances and concerns around the wellbeing and safety of our officers appearing”, said Curtis, “and asking for the committee and parliamentarians to consider that with respect to your own code of behaviour and standards.”
Curtis said she stood by the submission “because we have an obligation as the leaders of the public service – in particular in my role as the public service commissioner – to be very diligent in making sure that our staff are not exposed to things that can harm their wellbeing. We are not trying to stop public servants giving full and frank answers in a committee hearing.”
Greens Senator and committee member David Shoebridge objected to claims that such concerns were not taken seriously. “I am not aware of a single instance where a matter has been brought to the attention of the committee and it has not been treated with seriousness and has not been addressed,” he said.
Shoebridge admitted that senators can sometimes get frustrated with public servants who obfuscate and refuse to answer questions directly. “When answers are given of that nature, they will attract criticism. One of the clearest ways to avoid that criticism is for public servants to give direct, unambiguous answers to direct and unambiguous questions.”
Indian firm accessed Australian court files ‘Incredibly sensitive’ transcripts viewed.
ATO, ASIC feared data breach by supplier VIQ Solutions a year before it was public
Internal emails between the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) and the Australian Tax Office (ATO) exposed concerns that preferred government transcription provider, VIQ, had potentially offshored sensitive data, almost a year before the ABC first reported a court data breach by the same company.
The emails also show that ASIC, which was responsible for managing the relationship between VIQ as a preferred provider and government agencies, ignored an ATO request to assess whether other agencies had been impacted and instead left it up to VIQ.
The alarm was first raised around March 2025 when VIQ sent an email to the ATO that included a hyperlink to a transcript that was "available for download" from a site in the United Kingdom.
An assistant director at the ATO sent an email to both ASIC and VIQ stating:
"This appears to indicate the [sic] VIQ Solutions is already allowing customer data to be shared, accessed or used outside of Australia. This is of serious concern to the Australian Taxation Office."
The ATO and ASIC advised staff to stop using VIQ for transcription services until they had more information.
"We have requested that VIQ conduct an investigation and confirm that our data has not been sent overseas. We are also not utilising VIQ until the investigation is complete," an ASIC project coordinator wrote in an email chain that included ATO staff.
"If you haven't already, you may wish to request that a similar investigation is also completed for the ATO," the project coordinator wrote.
In the days that followed, concerns were raised about the integrity of the information being provided by VIQ in response to the potential breach.
"We have found some potential inconsistencies in VIQ response to date and more impacts the more questions we ask," an ATO director wrote.
By early May, VIQ had provided a report to ASIC about the potential breach. Based on the report, ASIC determined the incident was a "near miss" and that none of its own data had been compromised.
But there was no independent investigation into any other agency using the service.
An email from a project coordinator at ASIC on May 12, 2025 stated:
"Recently ASIC became aware of a potential data breach after Evidence Support Panel provider, VIQ, was thought to have sent ATO data processing offshore… This incident was determined to be a near miss, and we will work with VIQ to ensure that any risk mitigation and process improvements are implemented to ensure ongoing security..."
Litigants in at least 146 court matters were potentially involved in a data breach that is now the subject of a formal complaint with the privacy commissioner in Canada, Senate estimates has been told.
Greens senator David Shoebridge, who sits on the legal and constitutional affairs committee, said the numbers given by both courts were unreliable.
