Elizabeth O’Keeffe is a former senior public servant in the State Government of Victoria. She was executive director of Land Victoria from 1996 until 2002 and then the chief operating officer of the National Gallery of Victoria until 2005. After leaving the public service she was a director of Transparency International Australia until 2013.
Land Victoria O'Keeffe was the executive director (i.e. Chief Executive Officer) of Land Victoria, under the Department of National Resources and Environment (DNRE) from 1996 to 2002. O'Keeffe reported to the then Secretary of DNRE Chloe Munro from 1999 to 2002. Prior to 1999, O'Keeffe reported to then Secretary Michael Taylor (Mike Taylor (public servant)). Land Victoria (now called Land Use Victoria) is the land authority for the State Government of Victoria in Australia. Sherryl Garbutt was the responsible Minister.
O’Keeffe presented to an international conference in May 2001 on the establishment of Land Victoria in 1996. She described Land Victoria, as the agency within the state of Victoria with primary responsibility for land administration matters, and how it was intended to bring many of the State's core land administration functions into a single agency, specifically the functions of mapping, survey, valuation, Crown (or unalienated) land management and freehold title creation and registration. However, O’Keeffe's presented paper did not provided any background to the relevant laws. Indeed, the ignoring of the relevant laws and the assignment of responsibilities to other units within Land Victoria, without authority of even an approved service level agreement saw significant impacts on the statutory responsibilities of both the Surveyor-General and the Valuer-General. The O’Keeffe approach draws heavily upon the advice of Steven Jacoby, then Director of the Land Information Group, a unit within Land Victoria. Jacoby's responsibilities were largely transfers of responsibility from then Surveyor-General John Richard Parker, who stepped down in 1997.Jacoby, S., 1999, Developing a Common Geospatial Infrastructure between State and Local Governments a case study from Victoria, Australia., Paper presented at the 4th International Conference on GIS in Local Government, Seoul, Korea, 16–17 September 1999. As was later to be reported by the acting Surveyors-General during the period 1997-99 and in the reports by Surveyor-General Keith Bell from 1999 to 2003, there was no authority. Further, the Victorian Government Solicitor, Auditor-General and Ombudsman delivered several findings which confirmed there was no authorization. Significantly, under Land Victoria, a contract was established with the joint venture between the firms Data Flow and Logica to develop the Victorian property mapping database, Vicmap property. The problems with this work, including lack of completeness and poor spatial accuracy were reported by both the Valuer-General and Surveyor-General, but were not rectified by O'Keeffe and Jacoby.2001-2002 Annual Report by the Surveyor General Of Victoria on the Administration of the Survey Co-Ordination Act 1958, Keith C. Bell, RFD, Surveyor General of Victoria, Parliament of Victoria, https://www.vgls.vic.gov.au/client/en_AU/search/asset/1265623/0
O’Keeffe's tenure as executive director of Land Victoria was one of controversy, disagreements and scandals, including: 1. Estate Agency Guarantee Fund scandal; 2. Threats and intimidation the Surveyor-General; 3. Reassign statutory responsibilities of Surveyor-General to other units of Land Victoria, breaching legislation - including the contracting for Vicmap property database, Measurement Calibration, Survey Control Network, GPS Base Station network (CORS); 4. Weakening the Office of the Valuer-General and downgrading the statutory position; 5. Blocking independent expert investigations concerning the Lindsay Fox Portsea land-grabbing complaints; 6. Interference with the Victorian electoral boundary re-distribution process; 7. Threats of legal action to intimidate staff of Land Victoria.
Significantly, there were recurrent disagreements with key senior and statutory officers including Land Registrar and other senior Land Registry officials, Surveyor-General and Valuer-General and serious governance issues were raised repeatedly. Throughout these, O'Keeffe seemed to have enjoyed the strong support of Minister Garbutt and Secretary Munro, despite the frequent concerns raised by the State opposition and the media.
Estate Agents Guarantee Fund scandal O’Keeffe's leadership of Land Victoria was raised in the Victorian Parliament by Opposition environment spokesman Victor Perton on 17 April 2002 for her leading role in the Estate Agents Guarantee Fund (EAGF) scandal. Specifically, Perton reported that Land Victoria and the Department of Justice (DoJ) had "conspired to invent a 'survey reform' project to extract $7.5 million from the fund". Land Victoria, a division of DNRE, under direction of O’Keeffe, and in collaboration with DoJ, was reported to have attempted to create “the survey project” to obtain extra government funding through EAGF, despite already having been funded.Hansard, Legislative Assembly, 17 April 2002, pp861-863, Grievances, Victor Perton, https://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/4affe3/globalassets/hansard-historical-documents/weekly/2002/20020416-20020418-hansard-la.pdf The administration of EAGF was under DoJ.
O’Keeffe's role in the EAGF scandal was reported to have also involved obtaining high level political approval for wrongful access to EAGF funds between October and December 2000. This included “invention” of a $1.5 million “fraudulent survey project” as well as “other funds hidden away in smaller applications” totalling $7.5 million. It was also reported that the survey project proposal was not revealed by O’Keeffe to the Surveyor-General of Victoria. Perton reported that efforts by the then Surveyor-General to raise his concerns about the attempts to obtain funds inappropriately from EAGF through his office resulted in the Surveyor-General being threatened and intimidated by O'Keeffe. It was later reported that the Surveyor-General had earlier reported his concerns to the Auditor-General who stepped in to prevent it from proceeding. The Surveyor-General also reported his concerns to the Ombudsman. Perton, in April 2002 in Parliament and earlier in the media, quoted "from documents from 2001 in which the assistant director of land records and information services, Ivan Powell, talks of having 'invented some benefits' in regards to the project and of a request to 'invent another layer of detail'. Powell was a senior Land Registry official (under Land Victoria). Perton reported to the Parliament that O’Keeffe was acting with the full support of the responsible Minister, Sherryl Garbutt. Garbutt, the Minister for Conservation and Environment, to which Land Victoria was accountable.
Further, Perton reported that investigations by the Auditor-General and by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu (Deloitte) were not willingly assisted by O’Keeffe and Land Victoria. Requests for information and assistance by Deloitte's were blocked by Land Victoria. Perton reported that on 31 May 2001, Deloitte requested information from Land Victoria. In response, O’Keeffe's subordinate, John Hartigan, Director of the Land Registry (under Land Victoria) directed all staff to not comply with any request for information from Deloitte. Perton also reported that the Surveyor-General initially raised his concerns of the proposal to obtain funds from EAGF on 7 March 2001. His concerns were dismissed by O’Keeffe who “responded in threatening terms” that he was accountable to Garbutt and the Secretary (Munro) through O’Keeffe and Hartigan.
Specifically regarding the hiring of a legal firm and private investigators to investigate the Surveyor-General and his office, Garbutt advised that DENR under Munro had ordered an investigation but could find no evidence. In fact, efforts by DENR to blame the Surveyor-General for leaks were misplaced as Bell was a protected whistleblower, having gone through the appropriate channel to raise concerns with the Ombudsman. Thus, this was further evidence of malfeasance, including efforts to intimidate and harass the Surveyor-General, by O'Keeffe supported by Secretary Munro and endorsed by Minister Garbutt.
A subsequent investigation by the State Ombudsman, “A conspiracy between members of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment and of the Department of Justice to defraud the Estate Agents Guarantee Fund” found the attempt represented a conflict of interest and was not ethical. The Ombudsman advised two whistle-blowers had come forward to his office which led to his investigation in accordance with ‘public interest disclosures’ under section 50 the Whistle-blowers Protection Act 2001 and launched on 19 June 2002. The Ombudsman found that the "projectising" of the survey function was little more than a scheme to obtain additional funding, despite already being appropriated. The Ombudsman concluded: “Finally, the allegations that arose when this matter was placed under scrutiny ought to stand as a warning to those entrusted with determining the eligibility of applicants and/or programmes for funding from the various Statutory Trust Funds.”
Perton also reported to the Parliament that this was not the first attempt by Land Victoria to illegally obtain funds from the EAGF. The Auditor-General had prevented an earlier attempt by O’Keeffe-led Land Victoria and the Department of Justice to “raid the EAGF of $45 million".
Surveyor-General of Victoria The Opposition frequently raised its concerns regarding O’Keeffe's performance as the executive director of Land Victoria especially on matters of governance and accountability during the period 2001–02. O'Keeffe was especially cited for her interference with, including threats and intimidation of, the Surveyor-General, in the performance of his responsibilities. Such interference included: attempts to block or alter annual Surveyor-General reports; hiring of legal firm and private investigators to investigate the Surveyor-General and his office; and efforts to interfere with the Surveyor-General's review of State electoral boundaries in his capacity as an Electoral Boundaries Commissioner. Over the period 2001–04, The Age, Herald Sun and ABC carried numerous reports of such interference and it was frequently raised by the Opposition in both Houses of the Parliament of Victoria reported in Hansard. Such public reporting continued well after O’Keeffe departed Land Victoria in August 2002.Hansard 25 May 2004, pp1396-, Legislative Assembly, Surveying Bill Second Reading, https://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/4affe3/globalassets/hansard-historical-documents/weekly/2004/20040525-20040527-hansard-la.pdf
The Surveyor-General, through his annual reports required under the Survey Coordination Act (1958) reiterated concerns that while important responsibilities had been removed from him, he retained statutory accountability for them. In late 2001 the Auditor-General of Victoria undertook a performance audit of the survey information managed by Land Victoria. This review was tabled in Parliament in June 2002. The Auditor General confirmed concerns raised by Bell that key responsibilities assigned to the Surveyor-General under the Survey Co-ordination Act 1958 had been transferred to other units within Land Victoria, mainly the Land Information Group under its director, Steven Jacoby. Significantly, arising from the Auditor-General's review, as well as a further review by RMIT University and a further DNRE consultant's review “on a mutually agreed basis with the department” was the changed reporting of the Surveyor-General to the DNRE Deputy Secretary – Services, then Dale Seymour.