Looking forward to the holiday prospect of (insert dissolution of choice here)? Sorry, the Commonwealth Parliament’s Joint Committee of Public Accounts has got a job that needs doing

Submissions to its inquiry into the Australian National Audit Office’s report on the Australian Research Council’s administration of the National Competitive Grants Programme are due January 20.

They will not need to be long. The Auditor General found the ARC’s admin is “effective,” its processes “mature and effective” and performance management “largely effective.”

The ARC agreed, and accepted a suggestion that it could improve programme KPIs.

So why are members and senators bothering, people, suspecting a plot, ask? No conspiracy against research, folks who live on the hill say.  Just standard parliamentary oversight.