South Australia's Department of Premier and Cabinet says an employee has been suspended over the purchase of $80,000 worth of printer cartridges in three months.
The Opposition claims the Aboriginal Affairs Department paid $80,000 for 200 print cartridges earlier this year.
Opposition spokesman Rob Lucas told a parliamentary committee he is concerned because, in June, Victoria's ombudsman found public servants bought hundreds of thousands of dollars of over-priced cartridges in return for gifts such as credit cards.
"There are issues as to whether the price being paid was or wasn't above a government-approved contract price," he said.
Mr Lucas has applied to see all invoices of government departments for printer cartridges in the past four years but believes a wider investigation is warranted.
"There's an internal audit inquiry in relation to some issues in that particular division at the moment but it needs to be much more extensive than that," he said.
The Government says the matter has been referred to police and the Auditor-General.
Topics: law-crime-and-justice, government-and-politics, public-sector, indigenous-policy, states-and-territories
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