KEY POINTS:
It is Fraud Awareness Week this week, which is a good time to be looking more fully at what is happening at the Serious Fraud Office. The SFO is not about to be closed down. It is instead going to be a key part of a new agency to fight serious organised and financial crime.
But Saturday's Weekend Herald article has probably given the impression that there is considerable uncertainty about the future of a specialist agency to fight serious fraud. That picture was probably contributed to by two unfortunate inaccuracies. The story reported that Gib Beattie, SFO assistant director, had left "several months" before November 2007.
Beattie did not leave then - and has not left since. He is still with the SFO and is playing a major role in the transition we will be undergoing.
The story also said that numbers were well down on an operating establishment of 40.
The SFO has not had 40 staff for nearly 10 years, when there was a reduction in corporate services and support staff. Our operating establishment is 34 and has been for many years. We are running very close to that and certainly have been since last September.
There has been no exodus. People are not leaving at "an alarming rate". The appointment process that saw me replace David Bradshaw, who retired in November, was well advanced when the Government made its announcement in September that the SFO would become part of a new, specialised serious organised and financial crime agency.
Gus Andree Wiltens, the assistant director for prosecutions, and lawyer Mark Treleaven had also arranged to leave before the Government's decision. New lawyers and a new investigator have been hired.
Two accountants have now decided to leave and I was reported as saying that uncertainty about the future was part of their decision to leave but personal reasons were more important.
I am confident that we will recruit some highly skilled accountants - our advertisement doesn't close until the end of March and we have more than 30 applications.
There has been some staff turnover. That is an inevitable fact of life. There has been some uncertainty, but our present capacity to carry on with business as usual - combating serious and complex fraud - is almost at 100 per cent.
Your readers will probably have seen stories of recent cases, such as the Green Acres ironing franchise matter, which show the SFO in action.
As well, we have been putting renewed effort into collaboration with other government agencies, particularly the Police, the Securities Commission and the Commerce Commission.
Shortly, details will be announced of a joint investigative approach among agencies including the National Enforcement Unit of the Ministry of Economic Development, the Securities Commission and the SFO on finance company collapses.
But much of the uncertainty reported was in fact being lifted even before the story.
The Commissioner of Police, Howard Broad, and I have been working closely together to ensure that the SFO will be an integral part of the new agency. Broad has told people at the SFO of some important decisions:
* The new agency will continue to address serious and complex fraud and use SFO capability and experience in, for example, pursuing the financial angles of drug crime and in recovering assets of people involved in serious crime (under legislation before Parliament). The new agency will foster interagency co-operation.
* The new agency will be head-quartered in Wellington, but SFO staff will continue to operate from the SFO's present premises in Auckland, at least in the short to medium term.
* Senior police and SFO management are working closely on the transition.
The SFO staff are integral to the new agency. Jobs are safe - everyone will transfer into the new agency. There will be no redundancies and no job losses.
The picture is not portrayed in the story under the headline "Serious trouble". Work is being done now on how the agency will look and function.
People at the SFO are participating in planning for the new agency. The future for our business is very exciting. The public can be assured that people with the specialist skills to fight serious financial crime are still on the job, and will be in the future.
* Grant Liddell is director and chief executive of the Serious Fraud Office.
