Matanyahu Engelman, the state comptroller, found that referring most of the manpower at the Biological Institute to find a vaccine to Corona harmed his routine work, according to a report published today (Wednesday).
Following the outbreak of the corona plague, the then director of the institute turned to the then prime minister and offered the institute's assistance in dealing with the plague.
The Prime Minister accepted the proposal and, following the then Prime Minister's directive, the Institute was carried out: about 90% of all biology field workers were recruited to carry out the tasks, and as a result most of the biology work plans for 2020 were not carried out.
The other research areas - environmental area and chemistry area, also dealt with various aspects of research related to the corona virus in about 20% of their work plans.
Another thing that is under criticism concerns the relationship between the number of researchers and the number of research fellows at the institute is such as the "inverted pyramid".
As of August 2020, the research staff at the institute numbered 200 employees - 137 researchers (Ph.D.), and 63 research fellows, with bachelor's or master's degrees in the fields of knowledge relevant to the institute, ie a ratio of 2.2 researchers per research fellow.
The cost of employing researchers is much higher than that of research fellows and the average salary of researchers is 60% higher than that of research fellows.
In addition, researchers are entitled to a paid sabbatical year and a dollar study fund.
Ganz visits the Biological Institute, archive, photo: Ministry of Defense spokeswoman
This reality creates a situation where work plans that are executed quite by a single research fellow are staffed by several researchers and that a working group that once consisted of technicians who engaged in equipment deployment, is now staffed by researchers as well.
Researchers have also been found to be on duty to wash vials, examine vials, fill and collect them.
In addition, since 2015, organizational changes have been made at the institute without the institute defining the need for the created positions, the organizational purpose of the changes and the problems to be solved, and without clearing the gaps and performing the assessment of resources required to make the changes relative to the existing organizational situation.
Changes made were brought to the approval of the Civil Service Commission gradually, without the application having an overall view of all the changes and their purpose.
The organizational changes were not brought to the attention and approval of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for defense prior to their implementation.
The inspection revealed that the recruitment of employees at the institute and the processes of promoting the employees as well as the various supervisory committees in it take place improperly when it is not clear how and why employees were hired, it is not known how many of the jobs were advertised to the general public on the institute's website.
For example, it turns out that although the institute advertises vacancies on its website, about 61% of all employees recruited by the institute in 2020-2013 and do not engage in research, previously worked at the institute through staffing companies or other providers who provided services to the institute.
Beyond that, the control committee of the institutes' departments worked without procedures and without all the people defined in the standard and did not give reasons for its decisions in writing. A similar situation exists with regard to the institute's advisory committees.
The audit revealed that the then director of the institute acted to give the chairman of the committee the rank, not on the basis of the employee's professional achievements. And without the required professional achievements.
Also, from 2014 to the end of 2020, the institute increased the scope of positions entitling to salary increases by 75%.
The institute did not examine the implications of this in terms of budget, and the additions were not brought to the approval of the assistant defense minister for defense.
The Ministry of Defense responded: "We accept the main recommendations of the State Comptroller's report in the field of personnel management at the Institute for Biological Research.
The Ministry of Defense is working with the director of the new biological institute, Dr. Shmuel Yitzhaki, and the Civil Service Commission to correct all the deficiencies and implement the auditor's recommendations. Some of them have long since been completed. "
Israel is not doing enough to return property from the Holocaust
The administrative bodies that dealt with the restoration of Jewish property in Europe did not deal with the issue of the restoration of Jewish property that was confiscated in North African countries during the Holocaust.
In addition, most Eastern European countries have not yet implemented the principles of the 2009 "Terezin Declaration" nor the guidelines for its implementation from 2010, and the Foreign Ministry has not yet exhausted the diplomatic and informational means at its disposal to promote it.
This is how the State Comptroller's report on the restoration of the rights and property of Holocaust victims and survivors confiscated in European countries during the Nazi regime and its partners (data collected between 2020-2018, from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Social Equality).
The report further states that dedicated ministerial committees and steering committees established by the government in 2003, ceased to operate in 2009 and have not been re-established since.
Moreover, in three of the five countries in which the Ministry of Social Equality's annual work programs focused, the goals set in the work plans were not achieved, and in two countries the required goals were partially achieved.
It also emerged that from 2010 onwards, the Ministry of Social Equality did not make estimates of the value of private and community Jewish property in European countries in full, less the amounts of compensation paid.
State Comptroller Matanya Engelman, Photo: Oren Ben Hakon
And that's not all: the audit found that the strategic plan for mapping, locating and restoring Jewish property from European countries, devised by the Ministry of Social Equality in 2008, was not fully implemented, except for the HEART project, which took place in 2014-2013.
The raw information received from the applicants as part of the project was not improved and processed, and the ministry did not reflect the information and its meanings to the public.
In contrast, the report noted the Ministry of Social Equality's achievements in survivors' pensions and pensions, especially for survivors in ghettos in Romania, and the ministry's initiative to promote the discovery of artefacts stolen from their Jewish owners and found in Germany.
Comptroller Engelman noted in the report that the Ministry of Social Equality should set "measurable and achievable goals" with the relevant government ministries in the annual work plans.
It is recommended that the Ministry transfer the care of private Jewish property abroad to the Custodian General and reflect to the public the data on the value of private and community Jewish property and work to encourage more countries to locate artefacts looted from Jews during the Holocaust. Making understandings between them and the administrative bodies to remove the bureaucratic obstacles that complicate the prosecution processes of survivors and their heirs.
The value of Jewish, private and community property was estimated in 2010 at $ 212 billion to $ 673 billion.
Hence the importance of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Social Equality presenting a comprehensive operational plan including reference to political and diplomatic aspects.
Cyber issues in the Central Election Commission
The State Comptroller published a report in which he examined the three election campaigns that took place in Israel in the short term (Revenues 21-22-23) with an emphasis on managing the information system of the Election Commission and the cyber protection of this information system to which voting results were entered. These three election campaigns cost about NIS 1 billion, of which NIS 139 million was directed to the Electoral Commission's computerized system.
The Comptroller also notes that in terms of dual-envelope voters, who voted outside their place of residence, there was a 37 percent increase in the number of these voters from the 21st Knesset election to the 23rd Knesset election when the overall increase in the number of voters was only 6.3 percent.
These are 333,603 voters.
A disturbing finding in relation to the double envelopes is that about 23 percent of the double envelopes that were rejected belonged to the members of the ballot committee or to the secretaries of the ballot committee.
That is, it turns out that no small percentage of the people who were supposed to monitor the purity of the election did not know how to vote when it came to them and their need to use a double envelope.
The Logistics Center of the Election Commission, Photo: Yossi Zeliger
In the area of protection of the system from cyber attacks, it emerged that although a comprehensive policy for routine times and elections was supposed to be formulated, there were gaps in the formulation of this policy.
In addition, the steering committee for the cyber defense of the system established in November 2018 did not convene until after the audit ended in August 2020 and did not convene at all during the three election campaigns.
Also due to the proximity of the three election systems the cyber array and YAV, which conducted checks and cyber tests to examine weaknesses of the system, could only perform partial tests and the recommendations for changes or deficiencies discovered were partially addressed and here too often the corrections were made by alternative means.
In addition, the Central Election Commission did not have a complete picture of the information systems used by it as well as of the interactions between the systems.
There was also no document that defined what the systems are and what processes are required to maintain the functioning of the system during the election period as well as how long it takes for these systems to recover in the event of an attack.
The level of protection required for the information contained in the systems of the Election Commission and especially the sensitive information in the system was not defined and gaps were also found in the level of logical protection.
Worse, gaps were found even in the physical security of the information in these three election campaigns.
The auditor also examined the databases of about 19 parties, including information on voters' political views and other sensitive information, and found that not every party applied the Privacy Protection Law to the same level in terms of protecting the system.
The Comptroller found that in the case of an application to the Election Commission alleging violation of the purity of the election the current status of the application was not published whether it was closed or transferred for further treatment, it was found that one person can complete the entire application examination procedure without having an audit to avoid mistakes.
In the election campaign for the 23rd Knesset, it became clear that 80 voters voted on behalf of people who died.
It also turned out that 1,600 voters voted on behalf of people living abroad who could not actually vote.
The auditor also found that in the various systems used by the system for various purposes such as advertising turnout and results were found to be defective and in most cases the maintenance contract from outside companies is about to end without there being preparations to replace these companies.
The legal system has remained analogous in the digital age
An entire chapter in the State Comptroller's report has been devoted to the management of processes through a legal network system, a system that allows access to legal cases and the execution of certain actions in them, hearings and protocols with identification.
The State Comptroller conducted an audit that included an analysis of databases of cases conducted in the system in the years 2017-2019 using three questionnaires: a questionnaire for 19 units in government bodies, a questionnaire for the general public and a questionnaire for court administration employees.
The audit revealed that about a decade after the operation of the court net system, the Supreme Court manages the cases in a separate system based on paper cases.
Also, 4 of the 20 local courts have not yet been connected to the system.
It was found that most of the actions required by the general public and government bodies to manage the legal process are still done by manual means - opening cases: 70%, submitting applications: 64%, summonses and hearings: 83% while mailing documents: 34%.
For example - 1.8 million cases are submitted manually out of 2.6 million cases opened between the years 2017 - 2019. Using the system for which it was founded would save about a million working hours per year.
It also emerged that out of 19 units in government bodies, 14 units do not conduct their work with the administration of the courts in computerized interfaces.
Supreme Court, Archive, Photo: Jonathan Shaul
The report notes that the administration of the courts did not take into account relevant considerations for establishing interfaces vis-à-vis government bodies.
It was found that requests for interface development have been processed for more than two years, including two requests that have been processed for about 8 years.
It was found that the administration of the courts did not conduct satisfaction surveys among the external users of the system.
Among the internal users, no satisfaction surveys were conducted after 2017.
It was also found that about a third of the cases were not published in Bennett Mishpat at all, in addition to the 12% that were subject to sweeping confidentiality.
Since the Government ICT Authority and the Population Authority have not yet completed the preparations for activating the approved electronic signature on the basis of the smart ID card, the full use of the trial net system, which may be provided free of charge, actually involves payment.
For reasons of privacy of the parties involved, the system does not allow information to be found by searching by the names of the parties, although in practice this information is published on commercial sites.
In this situation, users are forced to pay for access to commercially operated sites, those that offer the information in a more cataloged and accessible way.
Satisfaction surveys conducted by the State Comptroller's Office show that about two-thirds of users, both internal and external, are satisfied with the legal net system, in the aspects examined.
Following the audit, the court administration stressed that today it believes the justice system should strive to have a hybrid system that combines digitization and online procedures for paper use and frontal proceedings - that is, court management with less paper.
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