KPMG chairman Martin Sheppard and senior auditors will resign following a heated parliamentary hearing last Friday, prompted by multiple scandals at the Big 4 firm.
KPMG has been accused of a string of misdemeanours, including misusing confidential client information to get more audit work and mistreating a whistleblower.
The Labor Government is under mounting pressure to address the gaps in regulation of the Big 4. It currently has 297 active contracts with KPMG totalling $653 million of public money.
The Greens say the latest resignations at KPMG are essential but much more needs to be done to clean up the mess of unethical contracting rife across KPMG.
As stated by Greens finance and public service spokesperson Senator Barbara Pocock:
"The KPMG resignations are absolutely necessary but so much more needs to be done to fix the rot throughout KPMG and the regulatory failure of the Big 4.
"The chairperson was completely embedded in KPMG's failed decisions and must take responsibility as a senior leader.
"Throughout the hearing, KPMG's senior leaders hid behind 'legal professional privilege' to avoid accountability. Their lack of transparency is an insult to the parliament and to the Australian people.
"The governance of KPMG is grossly inadequate. The senior leaders at KPMG have shown the parliament and Australian public that they are not up to the job, they have failed basic ethical tests, and that KPMG is not fit for government work.
"The hearing showed that KPMG's so-called 'independent directors' are not truly independent. These directors should have followed the example of Mike Baird and left an organisation whose governance has failed. Instead, they took direction from senior officers within KPMG.
"KPMG has demonstrated a toxic culture of retaliation, fear and retribution, and profit at all costs. The parliament has heard how the whistleblower was 'threatened' and 'retaliated against' for speaking up against KPMG.
"KPMG must have a proper corporate structure with clear lines of responsibility and a board that is truly independent to take responsibility for actions within the firm.
"The Labor Government needs to close the loopholes that allow the Big 4 to behave like marauding cowboys and to operate in unregulatory gaps. They must be taxed and face the same transparency obligations as other big firms.
"As the inquiry demonstrated, there is an urgent need for corporate whistleblower protections to extend to the Big 4 and for a new whistleblower authority that actually supports and protects whistleblowers.
"The Big 4 firms must be prevented from donating to political parties and held to account for their behaviour."
