Ministries and government departments are using outdated IT systems, the National Audit Office has found.

The aim of the audit, conducted annually, was to analyse the effectiveness of the use of IT systems and to assess whether the necessary controls are in place to maintain data confidentiality and integrity.

The Auditor General focused on the Office of the Prime Minister, Ministry for Finance, Ministry for Education and Employment and Ministry for Justice, Culture and Local Government.

It noted that the systems used, known collectively as human resources information management system (HRIMS), were “legacy systems”, meaning they were outdated and caused problems in terms of compatibility with more modern software.

The Audit Office said it also noticed inconsistencies across the different departments when updating workers’ personal details. It recommended that all ministries and departments follow “a common process flow”.

Issues with career progressions and promotions systems were also flagged, with the Auditor General pointing out that the audited ministries each had their own separate methodologies. It said such processes should be streamlined and made consistent throughout each ministry or line department.

Systems that required “substantial manual inputting and possible duplication of processes” should be stopped and replaced with others less prone to human error, the Audit Office said.

It concluded that, overall, it was worried that the audited ministries did not have a uniform, formal approach for the identification of employees’ skills, noting that the necessary tools to do so were also missing.