Australia's new Bureau of Meteorology chief has publicly disclosed that the staggering $96.5 million price tag for its controversial website redesign was widely known inside the agency, describing it as an open secret.
Transparency Drive Reveals True Cost
Just two weeks into his role, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Meteorology Dr Stuart Minchin stated a push for transparency led him to release the full costings. The figure, which funded a comprehensive IT systems overhaul, was initially publicly quoted at just $4.1 million.
The revamped website, launched in October, was met with immediate and widespread criticism. Users flocked to social media to complain that the update was more difficult to navigate and that the weather radar had become harder to interpret.
Where the $96.5 Million Was Spent
A detailed breakdown shows that of the total $96.5 million in funding, a substantial $79.8 million was spent building the upgrade. This involved reconstructing core IT technology and installing a new supercomputer to manage the vast data flows from observation networks and weather models.
The lion's share of this budget, $78 million, was paid to private consultancy firm Accenture Australia to develop the new website's content management system. This CMS contract, scheduled from August 2019 to 2027, was initially valued at $31.3 million.
Further costs included $4.1 million for the public-facing website design itself, which is now slated for updates due to user feedback, and $12.6 million to launch and security test the system. The security investment was deemed critical following an attempted hack on the bureau in 2015.
Explaining the Discrepancy and Justifying the Spend
Dr Minchin attributed the initial $4.1 million quote to a miscommunication. He explained that a journalist's specific question about website design costs was answered directly, rather than with the context of the broader project.
Look, I've only been in the bureau for two weeks. As soon as I started, I started looking into this issue. It's been quite open within the bureau, the cost of this, Dr Minchin told ABC Radio.
He emphasised that the project was far more than a simple website refresh, calling it a massive investment. The website component is about 10 per cent of a much larger program of replacing all of the bureau's back-end systems and processes, he said, highlighting the installation of a backup supercomputer.
Dr Minchin also pointed to a real and urgent need to address security vulnerabilities, stating the old system would have been very insecure without the update. He confirmed the full costs were known to the government, having been approved by the Turnbull government in 2017 and included in subsequent budgets.
Environment Minister Murray Watt expressed confidence in Dr Minchin to investigate the matter but criticised the bureau's earlier public messaging, saying the costings could have been more fulsome. He told the Senate he was pretty unimpressed with how the situation was handled publicly.
