The country’s Commerce Commission is calling for the hand-over of documents that include information on Fuji Xerox
In the latest development in Fuji Xerox’s accounting scandal, which involved the company’s Australian and New Zealand subsidiaries, Stuff reports that the New Zealand Commerce Commission has ordered the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) to “hand over documents that include information concerning scandal-hit Fuji Xerox.”
While the regulator stated that neither the ministry nor Xerox were under investigation, the Commission has “taken the rare step of issuing the ministry with a “Section 98” order compelling it to release documents”. Its spokeswoman stated that this was done due to the fact that Fuji Xerox’s voluntary suspension of competing for government business was “potentially relevant” to an investigation “into a proposed merger between rival office products firms Staples and OfficeMax.”
The Commission’s spokeswoman also said that the order was given because the Ministry was “not willing to provide supplier information on a voluntary basis”, though this refusal seemed to be a mere formality.
Annie Coughlan, spokeswoman for the MBIE, declared, “The ministry can’t just give out information; it must be done for a reason. The order allows us to provide the information.”
According to a source from the industry, the issuing of the Section 98 order may “nevertheless suggest the competition regulator was not willing to take at face value information that MBIE had previously provided about the Staples-OfficeMax merger.”
In May 2017, NZ First leader, Winston Peters, said in Parliament that in 2015 Peter Thomas, a former deputy chief executive at the Ministry, had left to join Fuji Xerox “just before it won a multi-million dollar government contract”, a move which he described as a “prima facie conflict of interest.”
Ministry spokeswoman Coughlan said that Thomas had left the MBIE two months after Xerox’s appointment to the all-of-government office supplies panel and that while his ministry responsibilities had included procurement, he had “no role in the process or decision regarding the appointment of Fuji Xerox to the office supplies panel.”
In June, Prime Minister Bill English declared in Parliament that “there was a thorough investigation of the matters raised by Peters” but “no issues came to light” and if any inappropriate or fraudulent behaviour were discovered, it would be investigated.