‘Naughtiest kid in the class’: former KPMG Australia COO grilled at hearing

During the hearing, Labor MP Tania Lawrence asked the former partners if their retirement was considered voluntary, which they confirmed to be true.

Lawrence pointedly noted that they were enabled a “dignified exit” with full retirement incentives, benefits, and entitlements despite them resigning due to alleged misconduct. She then turned to Hoggett and said she was not permitted to do so. Instead, as Hoggett pointed out, she was expelled, a move she called “unprecedented”.

Lawrence asked Hoggett to provide a closing remark on what she believes her expulsion says about KPMG’s disciplinary process when the committee just heard that the other former partners “also failed to meet their obligations under the partnership”, but they are “able to walk out into the sunset with benefits and their reputation somewhat intact”.

“What does that say about the current leadership of KPMG under the helm of Mr Ebeid (newly-appointed chair Michael Ebeid) and Mr Sams (KPMG CEO John Sams) about the disciplinary process and how serious they are of the conduct, or whether it's what's driven by external pressure that's seen you as being labelled as the bad apple and has now exited the building?” Lawrence asked Hoggett.

Hoggett responded that she is trying to “ascertain why the firm took this particular action… in regards to me, based on one conduct matter”.

She continued: “I've been at the firm for 33 years since I was 20 years old. I've never had a conduct matter. It seemed there’s not an opportunity for me to engage with the firm around the action that they took with me.”

Lawrence asked Hoggett if she feels like she was the “fall guy” during this crisis, to which Hoggett said it is not fair for her to speculate why the new CEO (Sams) expelled her without any engagement.

“But what I would say is that I am still trying to engage with the firm to ascertain why they took that action. Sensibly, I'm looking at all of my possibilities to explore that further,” Hoggett said.

Hoggett outlined the financial penalty she faces as a result of her expulsion. She said will not receive entitlements such as accrued annual leave, retirement payments, and she was not paid for the last month until the date of her expulsion.

Hoggett admits to writing email about confidential documents in locker

During the hearing, ALP Senator Deborah O’Neill said Hoggett was the “naughtiest kid in the class at the moment”.

She asked Hoggett about a “pivotal” email she wrote to her personal assistant referring to the confidential documents relating to the Lendlease audit, which was retained in a locker at KPMG’s Sydney office.

The email from May 2023 said: “I think we confidently allow him to look at the printed version in my locker when he [director on the Lendlease audit] is back in Sydney. He needs to do it sensitively without letting too many people know [smiley face emoji].”

O’Neill said this email has “contradicted a long denial that there was the sharing of confidential information”

“I find it hard that if you've written that email, you’re struggling to recall the use of this document that was in your locker that your EA was providing,” she said.

“I want to give you the opportunity to recall my opening remarks about not misleading, and to actually put on the record what was going on.”

Hoggett responded that she became aware of the email three weeks ago.

O’Neill said: “No, no, no, no, no. That is not a satisfactory answer. No, no. Miss Hoggett, did you write the email? It is in your name.”

Hoggett admitted that she did indeed send the email.

O’Neill then continued: “You were aware of it when you wrote it the first time. You were aware of it when you wrote it. You made a conscious decision to write that text and to send it. There is no world where you say, ‘oh, I'm aware of that now’. You were aware, you were conscious, living, breathing person, earning $1.5 million a year when you wrote that email. So, let's just start there.”

Hoggett said: “Senator, there is no one more disappointed in me than myself.”

O’Neill underscored that rather than this being a personal attack, she is pinpointing the cultural practices in a partnership Hoggett has been a part of since she was 20 years old.

The inquiry covered significant ground around the alleged conduct of KPMG. We present a guide on what was said.

There are ‘many, many’ more whistleblowers out there

During the hearing, Labor Senator Deborah O’Neill said there are “many, many” more whistleblowers who have contacted the parliamentary committee to raise concerns about misconduct at KPMG, and a repeat of similar behaviour. This is in addition to the whistleblower in the tax division raised earlier by Pocock.

She slammed the manner in which KPMG treats whistleblowers, stating that the standard of treatment has no “currency with what people think is a whistleblower speak-up culture”.

“There is no connection between what people think you're doing and what the PR is and what all the lovely glossy documents are and what the whistleblower's testimony to us has represented,” she said.

“You weren’t paid to look after whistleblowers. It’s not identified as part of your salary as a special role. It’s just part of what you do when you get to the top of the food chain.”

Former partners asked point blank if they failed in their obligations

Labor MP Tania Lawrence asked every former partner if they failed in their partner and professional obligations. She referred to the partners’ agreement where partners acknowledge that they have important legal, fiduciary, and ethical obligations to each other and the firm.

“Amongst different obligations, some include not to undertake any activity which is detrimental to or could put at risk the financial, property, or reputational interests of the firms. If I can just go through one by one, just a yes or no,” Lawrence said.

McPherson said he “should have and could have done things differently”, while Yates said he has “taken accountability for all the things that I feel failed under my watch”. Lawry said “in respect to my involvement in the matters that I’m involved in, I haven’t”.

Sheppard said he believes that “I continue to meet my professional standards”, to which Lawrence said: “You do, but you fail the obligations as set out in your partner obligations to KPMG because you have put at risk the financial, the property, or the reputational interests of the firm, have you not?”

Sheppard replied: “In the broader sense of my involvement in this matter, yes. No in terms of the activity which you described and I’ve not been sanctioned in any way by the firm yet”.

Hoggett responded that she “self-reported my conduct”, and added that “I don’t feel like I failed that obligation… I made a mistake and I’m very sorry for it”.

Deputy counsel apologises, external firms likened to ‘Pulp Fiction cleaner’

James McClelland, executive director and deputy general counsel of KPMG, expressed regret over the June 2024 internal report that dismissed allegations made by the whistleblower.

In the frank admission on Friday afternoon, McClelland said the work he undertook “was fundamentally undermined by the answers” given by senior employees of KPMG, of which were “misleading, if not directly deceptive, to the questions that I asked”.

He also reflected on the “nature and tenure” of the emails sent to the whistleblower, on instruction from the firm.

“I want to take this opportunity to say I am sorry, I am sorry I have been a part of this, I am sorry,” McClelland said.

His superior, the now-resigned general counsel Louise Capon, told the inquiry she did not oversee any investigation undertaken by McClelland and had no oversight of the whistleblower policy.

McClelland and Capon were seated beside partners for Allens and Ashurst, firms that were separately engaged to conduct external investigations of the allegations following McClelland’s report.

Documents previously protected under legal professional privilege appeared before the inquiry hearing for the first time.

Greens’ Senator Deborah Pocock said a report prepared by Allens in December 2025 – which did not substantiate a single allegation – was “very, very poor” and they should “give up investigations”.

Pocock also accused the firm of working in a “conflict of interest” and allowed itself to be used as “delay and cover” for KPMG.

Partner Ross Drinnan said he did not accept this characterisation.

“We are lawyers with legal and ethical obligations, we were given a set of instructions, we carefully, thoroughly worked through those instructions, we delivered a report, we consider that report appropriately reflects our professional judgement in December 2025 and we stand by it,” Drinnan insisted in reply.

Lea Constantine, partner for Ashurst – which also fielded criticisms of its own work – said she did not accept the proposition.

Senator Paul Scarr for the Liberal National Party grilled both firms on why a forensic examination of KPMG emails was not done at the outset. He said a later examination uncovered an “absolute mess”.

Lawyers for Allens said the examination would have been a disproportionate response to their scope of inquiry.

While Ashurst accepted, in hindsight, an examination would have uncovered key material earlier, its lawyers did not accept the proposition that the work it did complete was unsatisfactory.

Inquiry chair and senator Deborah O’Neill said the firms had been engaged similarly to “Mr Wolf in Pulp Fiction, who is the cleaner when there is a big mishap in the middle of that film”.

“It feels an awful lot like that to me from where I sit and I don’t know how this system upon which we rely, the proper law of the land, allows lawyers to be paid to come in and allow their names to be used as investigators, declared as investigators, when what you are being asked to do is totally at odds with what ordinary Australians would think of an investigation,” O’Neill said.

“I think you have been positioned terribly in this, very terribly.”

Chairman’s independence under fire

KPMG’s latest chairman, Michael Ebeid, joined the inquiry after stepping into his role yesterday (13 August).

Ebeid told the committee that he has sought to establish an election system for the chairperson in line with ASX companies, where the board and independent directors would vote for the position, as opposed to the former system where partners would vote on the totality.

He added that he wanted to bring his “corps experience” to the chairman role.

“I think I have a lot to be able to provide,” Ebeid said.

Ebeid won the role under the previous election system, which KPMG deputy chair Carmel Mortell said was after a partnership vote by a significant majority. During the inquiry, it was revealed that Ebeid was the singular candidate put forward, where the prior election saw three.

Chair of the committee, Senator Deborah O’Neill said: “No more cosplaying corporations.”

When asked about his independence, Ebeid revealed that his previous work on the KPMG subcommittee was not remunerated.

“I don’t know how this made you independent. It would make you pretty powerless,” O’Neill said.

It was revealed that Ebeid is now paid around $1 million to be the firm’s independent chairman.

“A million dollars [to be] independent. Why is it worth a million dollars now when the ‘independent tag’ [was] worth zero … last August?” O’Neill said.

“There's something really, really lost about the power structure there,” she said.