Three Papua New Guinea medical employees were all deployed to Manus Island in January, according to internal IHMS documents that detail foreign staff employees.
At the time the staff were employed, the contract between IHMS and the immigration department said that “appropriate and reasonable investigations of the suitability” of staff needed to be undertaken, which must comprise “a review of each individual’s criminal, medical professional and employment history”.
A spokesman for the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, said the department was investigating the allegations raised, and a spokeswoman for IHMS said the company would internally investigate whether police checks were all properly declared to the immigration department.
The company provides monthly reports to the immigration department about how it is performing against a series of medical care benchmarks. These reports also include updates on whether clinical staff records are complete, and whether police checks are up to date. Failures to meet these requirements can lead to financial penalties called abatements.
In a version of the report marked “internal distribution only” the company is listed as failing this performance metric, with four staff out of 38 not having up-to-date records. As a result the company would have failed the metric, and then been subject to a financial penalty.
A note added to the document says: “Explanation needed from ops in Sydney as to why IHMS deployed four PNG nationals despite not having police checks.”
A subsequent document, “January performance report additional comments”, says, referring to the January Manus Island report: “A couple of missing police checks resulted in a slight miss on the staff records metric.”
But in the final version of the report that was sent to the immigration department, there are 36 total staff checks listed, with only one failure identified.
The one failed record in the report is explained: “The staff record that was identified as non-compliant at the time of assessment related to a PNG national employee who had not been provided the adequate criminal history check documentation from the local police authorities.
“This has subsequently been rectified and better communication channels have been established with the local police authorities to manage such requests on a timelier basis in future.”
No explanation is given for why the other staff members who did not have valid police checks were omitted from the final version of the report.
Guardian Australia has obtained certified copies of police checks of two of the three employees mentioned in the internal version of the report. Each of the checks are dated after their deployment date on Manus Island, and after the January 2013 performance report.
The company also identified a “compliance gap” of four police checks at Manus Island, in a separate, interim internal briefing from February 2013.
Guardian Australia asked IHMS how it could explain the discrepancy, and whether it had omitted references to the files in its final report to the immigration department.
A spokeswoman for IHMS said: “IHMS has a robust and extensive credentialing process in place for its staff. IHMS will investigate these specific claims further but notes that its employee records are private and confidential.”
A spokesman for Dutton said: “The claims being made relate to a period several years ago mainly under the previous Labor government and it was a period of great dysfunction.”
“Contracts for the provision of health services were renegotiated late last year under the Coalition and the performance measures in the new contracts were made more rigorous.”
“The Coalition government expects contract conditions to be met by any service provider.”
“The department is looking into the claims and the minister will consult with the department as this process proceeds.”