BOM chief hauled back to senate hearing

The head of the Bureau of Meteorology came under fire during a heated estimates hearing on Friday when a senator unleashed the “fury” of his colleagues on the weather boss.

BOM chief executive Dr Andrew Johnson was hauled back before the senate environment and communications legislation committee on Friday after he failed to answer questions about the bureau earlier this year.

Tasmanian senator Jonathon Duniam acknowledged the weather boss had apologised for his “lack of willingness to be forthcoming with information” then lambasted Dr Johnson for infuriating senators.

“You do realise in your performance, not just at the last estimates but ones previously, you managed to unite every single member of this committee in fury at your unwillingness to answer questions,” he said.

“It takes a lot for me to lose my temper, and last time I did. I don’t want to have to do it again. I don’t think this committee wants to find itself in the same situation.”

The BOM faced criticism for the cost of its Robust IT project which was initiated after a cyber security breach and major outages in 2015 and 2016.

The project finished in June this year with a budget blowout of $150m costing taxpayers $866m.

The BOM was also criticised for having a toxic workplace culture and getting major weather events wrong.

The Australian Financial Review reported farmers lost millions when they sold livestock last summer after the weather bureau forecast a big dry warning that eventuated into a wet summer.

The bureau also stated rainfalls would ease before a massive rain event flooded parts of north Queensland.

Dr Johnson told the committee the program delivered 90 per cent of its scope and the technology deployed was now more secure, stable and resilient as a result of the IT project.

“Robust has also delivered a new disaster recovery supercomputer and new and upgraded software applications that support critical services such as for floods, thunderstorms and tropical cyclones,” he said.

“It has also delivered a new bureau website that is currently undergoing testing by the Australian community.”

Dr Johnson said the program had run about 10 per cent over budget which was within reasonable tolerances given the unanticipated impacts of Covid on costs, supply chains and the movement of people.

He added funding allocated in the 2021 budget would pay for any transition work to sustain the benefits of the program.

“No new funding will be requested for this transition work during its life, Robust has been subject to a comprehensive assurance and review program at the most recent gateway review conducted in September 2024,” he said.

“The panel concluded that Robust has been successful, that its governance has been very effective, that its performance was considerably better than other comparable programs across government, Robust is ‘a good news story.’”

Dr Johnson said as a result of the project, the bureau’s system were more secure and less vulnerable to attacks by entities whose interests did not align with the nation.

“We are regrettably under constant attack by those entities,” he said.

He told the committee there would be less network outages and they would be able to respond more quickly to outages with less impact on the community.

“Whether it’s forecast warnings or space weather imagery or whatever radars, whatever it might be, we’ve got a capacity to bounce back quickly,” he said.

“The second disaster recovery super computer is a huge intervention to mitigate risk, but also a national asset that we’re working more broadly with the Australian scientific community to make available for other uses.

“There’s a whole bunch of new kit that’s come on board, new radars, new flood gauges, balloon launches that take profiles through the atmosphere,

“We’ve got better and more reliable data and better forecasts and warnings we can provide to the community.

“We’ve also upgraded many of our software and other applications, so our new tropical cyclone warning service, new flood capability, flood warning capability and tsunami warning capability.”