Asset management

A list of reports, articles, or published letters that discuss asset management.
Author portrait picture Valuing the priceless

Our museums and galleries play an important role in collecting and preserving irreplaceable heritage assets. Unsurprisingly, auditors take great interest in how these assets are valued.

Getting the right information to effectively manage public assets: Lessons from local authorities

December 2017: Elected councillors need relevant and reliable information to make good decisions about managing the assets they govern. As communities and environments change, the challenges that local authorities face and decisions they make are becoming more complex. We looked at how five local authorities approached identifying and gathering the right information about their assets...

Reflections from our audits: Investment and asset management

August 2017: This report brings together some reflections from our work under our work programme theme Investment and asset management. We encourage decision-makers to think about the matters raised in this report. Although aspects of asset management are done well by some public entities, there are significant issues to be addressed and challenges to meet if public assets are to continue to deliver the services that New Zealanders expect over the long term.

Managing the school property portfolio

July 2017: The school property portfolio, valued at about $14 billion at 30 June 2016, is one of the largest publicly owned portfolios of property assets. For this report, we looked at the effectiveness of the Ministry of Education’s property strategy and its role as an asset manager, including how well it plans, monitors, and reports on its performance against the strategy.

Managing the assets that distribute electricity

June 2017: We looked at how electricity distribution businesses were managing, maintaining, and investing in their networks to ensure that they could provide services to consumers for the long term.

Investing in tertiary education assets

February 2017: This report considers the effectiveness of investment in tertiary education sector assets to support educational success. There is an opportunity for education agencies, tertiary education institutions, and other stakeholders to explore the measurement of the effectiveness of investments in assets, and the potential opportunities for more sector-based investment decisions. We hope that this report will start conversations in the tertiary sector about the further development and reporting of a range of cost-effectiveness measures and tools, for the sector and for individual institutions.

District health boards’ response to asset management requirements since 2009

June 2016: We found that standard asset management practices, like knowing, monitoring and reporting on the condition and performance of assets and having integrated asset, service, and financial plans do not seem to be standard practice for more than half of DHBs. We also found that, since 2009, fewer than half of DHBs showed indicators of asset spending and building up money to pay for future assets at levels we think characterise good financial and asset management.

Governance and accountability for three Christchurch rebuild projects

December 2015: This report looks at the governance arrangements for three projects to rebuild essential facilities in Christchurch: the Bus Interchange, the New Central Library, and the Acute Services Building at Christchurch Hospital. We found that governance was most effective when there was a clear structure and when accountabilities, roles, and responsibilities were well defined and understood. Strong leadership was an important part of effective governance, and being clear about who is accountable for project outcomes supports effective governance.

Water and roads: Funding and management challenges

November 2014: Collectively, local authorities are responsible for more than $100 billion of community assets that provide essential everyday services. This report sets out an overview of the approach that local authorities are taking to managing their infrastructure assets. We focused on roading, water supply, wastewater, and storm water services...

Managing public assets

June 2013: The report sets out the results of our “stocktake” of the physical assets in the public sector. It provides an overview of those assets, their condition and value, maintenance and renewals, and what information is reported to decision-makers about these matters...

Insuring public assets

June 2013: The purpose of this paper is to provide a high-level view of the extent of insurance for many of the assets in the public sector and the main changes since 2010. By doing this, we hope to encourage further discussion by provoking relevant questions about insurance of public assets...

Transpower New Zealand Limited: Managing risks to transmission assets

September 2011: We audited how well Transpower is managing risks to the transmission system. We wanted to establish whether the owner and operator of the national electricity grid understood well the capacity constraints facing the grid and the risks posed by the condition of the grid assets, and was using this understanding to better maintain and invest in the grid...

Planning to meet the forecast demand for drinking water in Auckland

August 2011: A letter from the Auditor-General to the Chief Executives of Auckland Council and Watercare Services Limited on governance issues and a report on our initial findings and recommendations for Watercare to consider when developing its long-term plans for asset management and for funding arrangements...

New Zealand Transport Agency: Information and planning for maintaining and renewing the state highway network

September 2010: NZTA had good descriptive and condition information about the state highway roads, and it had a planning framework that enabled it to use this information for day-to-day maintenance and renewal of the road network. However, not all of its information was complete, especially for structures such as bridges and tunnels. Its long-term planning was also incomplete at the time of our audit...

Maintaining and renewing the rail network

July 2008: We carried out a performance audit to provide assurance about the effectiveness of Ontrack’s systems for maintaining and renewing the rail network...

Providing and Caring For School Property

August 2001: This is report assesses the Ministry’s performance in managing the property portfolio. We focused on the management arrangements in place between the Ministry and school Boards of Trustees, and the systems and processes for managing (including funding) the provision and maintenance of school property...