Welcome to the September edition of IBAC Insights. In July IBAC released one of its most significant reports to date, the Operation Sandon special report, with recommendations on how government can tighten the loopholes that can allow corruption and misconduct to occur between councils and property developers.

Today, the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC) released the findings of its Perceptions of Corruption Survey completed by Victorian Members of Parliament (MPs) and local government councillors. The voluntary survey for MPs and councillors builds on IBAC’s surveys in 2022 with state and local government employees, Victoria Police employees, business suppliers, and the Victorian community.

Leading Australian anti-corruption and public policy researcher Professor Adam Graycar has recently attended a meeting of the UN Anti-corruption Academic Initiative (ACAD) in Doha, sharing insights from the latest research on corruption with international colleagues. Here he discusses why you should be concerned about corruption, and how it affects you.

Dr Cindy Davids, Associate Professor at Deakin University’s School of Law, discusses how independent oversight of police conduct is important in establishing, building and maintaining community confidence in police.

Establishing a robust infrastructure of practical systems, processes and procedures will help public sector leaders build ethical cultures and provide a strong framework to support decision making when confronted with ethical challenges, says Dr Paul Grimes, Victoria’s Public Sector Commissioner. In this special feature, Dr Grimes outlines the steps public sector leaders can take to establish the infrastructure to support ethical conduct.

IBAC's primary functions are to prevent and expose public sector corruption and police misconduct. IBAC's Engagement Manager Olivia Kings says supporting public sector leaders at all levels to identify and understand the 'red flags' of corruption and take the required action is at the very centre of IBAC's work.

IBAC Principal Lawyer Philip Hill outlines the importance of confidentiality in protecting those who report corruption and misconduct. This is an abridged version of the article 'Who Can they Tell?', published in the December 2018 issue of the Law Institute Journal.