Outrageous costs

An OIA from the Taxpayers Union has found that Sport NZ has spent over $300,000 on two DEE surveys.

Putting aside the pros and cons of the subject matter, I was staggered by the cost. How could a fairly simple stakeholder survey cost $180,000?

Maybe I thought it was of 20,000 people over 1,000 organisations. Then I could halfway understand it.

But no it was a survey of 1,429 people over 109 organisations and produced a 39 page report.

I have done online stakeholder surveys of similar numbers for under $10,000. Now don’t get me wrong – this isn’t about me missing out. I generally never tender for government work as their typical RFPs are coma inducing, and we’re already at near full capacity. Its about whether taxpayers are getting $300,000 of value for a couple of surveys.