Defence has entered into a two-year contract with Adagold Aviation Pty Ltd for the provision of air sustainment services to the Middle East Area of Operations (MEAO).
The contract was signed on 22 October 2010 and will commence on 23 November 2010.
The contract represents a substantial improvement in value for money to the Commonwealth, with significant savings over the two-year term of the contract, according to Defence.
Following a complaint about aspects of the tender, the Secretary of Defence commissioned a probity review on 15 July 2010 into the 2010 tender for the provision of MEAO air sustainment services.
Defence’s Chief Audit Executive undertook this review.
Concurrently, PriceWaterhouseCoopers independently validated Defence’s probity review process.
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu and the Australian Government Solicitor were subsequently engaged on 2 September 2010 to conduct an additional independent assessment regarding the financial viability of the preferred tenderer, Strategic Aviation, and the overall selection process.
Those aspects were beyond the scope of the Chief Audit Executive’s probity review.
That assessment did not identify any evidence of bias in the process, any outside influence that could have compromised the overall selection process or any reason that would suggest that the tenderer was not a fit and proper organisation.
These findings were consistent with the outcome of the Defence probity review.
The review arose over earlier reports that the winning tenderer had received crucial information about the cargo space required before the tender documents were released, enabling it to add a suitably larger aircraft to its operator’s certificate.
It was claimed that such information could only have come from within Defence.
Adagold is privately owned and managed and does not hold ownership interests in any aircraft.
According to the company this guarantees its independence, without bias or allegiance, in the provision of air charter solutions.