Taxation commissioner Rob Heferen has used the departure of longstanding second commissioner and chief information officer Ramez Katf to restructure statutory heads within the Australia Taxation Office’s (ATO) business groups, with the tech chief’s role downshifted to a Senior Executive Service Band 3 level ahead of a permanent replacement being named.
Heferen has told ATO staff that the head of service delivery role will be elevated to a statutory appointment, while the chief information officer position will be pushed back to the SES. The difference is that it is officially the governor-general who makes the ATO’s second commissioner appointments.
“I have made the decision, with the support of the Treasurer, to change the head of Service Delivery Group (currently a Band 3 position) to a Second Commissioner role. As a result, I am changing the CIO (head of Enterprise Solutions and Technology Group) from a statutory Second Commissioner appointment to a Band 3 senior executive position,” Heferen said.
“This change creates a model where the 3 Second Commissioners have oversight of our 3 core tax business arms (Service Delivery, Client Engagement, and Law Design and Practice). Importantly, we will then have Band 3 Chief Information Officer and Chief Operating Officer roles with oversight of the 2 critical enabling arms (Enterprise Strategy and Corporate Operations, and Enterprise Solutions and Technology).”
The switch means that the service delivery leadership function will be elevated while the information technology function will be pulled back, with Katf’s departure making this possible without the need for an awkward paring-back of seniority in his former role.
“I am pleased to announce the Treasurer’s appointment of David Allen as the acting Second Commissioner of Taxation from 1 May 2024 to 31 July 2024,” Heferen said.
“In this role, David will continue to lead our Service Delivery Group, which will ensure we are well prepared for Tax Time 2024.”
But there is also movement on the IT side. With highly respected Tax CIO Katf officially no longer ‘on-prem’ as of Monday, Heferen has also revealed interim arrangements pending a permanent replacement.
“I recently completed the EOI [expression of interest] process for the CIO role. I am pleased to advise Matthew Hay will be acting in the role, while I consider longer-term filling,” Heferen said.
As of Tuesday, Hay was listed as the Deputy Commissioner for Strategy and Architecture, indicating his acting CIO role will get him booted up to an SES Band 3 as the ATO looks for a replacement.
It’s likely a prudent move, given the relegation of the ATO CIO’s role out of a statutory appointment will make it somewhat harder to find an external replacement for Katf — if one can be found.
Secretary of the Taxation Officers’ Branch of the Australian Services Union Jeff Lapidos told The Mandarin it was concerning the role of ATO’s tech chief had lost its statutory appointment status given the importance of the revenue agency’s IT shop to its performance.
The real question is whether the treasurer wants to make major changes to the tax system in the same way the Henry tax review made several recommendations the government of the day did not adopt.
A major issue with the Henry review was that it previously took Tax so long to deliver a new core system under the decade-long ‘Change Program’ that it arrived in the year the whole system was then re-engineered, a feat usually seen in the Department of Defence.
It is anticipated that more about Tax’s future state will be revealed following the Budget this month.
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