Treasury seeks legal SaaS solution to replace 'basic' SharePoint search

Federal Treasury lawyers are having to rely on SharePoint and Excel to source knowledge and precedents for their “increasing volume” of legal cases. 

Legal teams for the Takeovers Panel (TOP) and General Counsel Branch (GCB) are currently unable to quickly access information due to "SharePoint’s basic search function".

The Treasury is also concerned its current environment has created a “heightened risk of providing inconsistent advice which may expose [it] to litigation and reputational damage”.

The Treasury now seeks purpose-built software to aid TOP and GCB lawyers and legal administrators handle with day-to-day work

According to a request for information, the solution is expected to help TOP and GCB “in managing increasing volumes of legal matters”.

“A reasonable number of these cases are complex in nature and are not suited to the current processes used to manage them,” the Treasury said.

This has led to Treasury legal teams facing an “unnecessary burden” on their “already time-critical nature of the work”.

A Treasury spokesperson declined to comment on the reasons for the timing of the project when contacted by iTnews. 

“Legal knowledge and precedents are difficult to find and access due to a lack of a central repository for matters,” the RFQ stated.

“Currently, SharePoint, Excel and shared drives are used to store current and historical matters, and SharePoint’s basic search function does not assist in retrieving information quickly.”

Lastly, the RFQ outlined the existing system’s lack of “interface with external stakeholders” who need to access “sensitive legal documentation during the matter processes”.

The Treasury now seeks to alleviate these issues with a legal matter management SaaS solution that is compatible with either its on-premises environment or Microsoft Azure.

Critically, the department hopes the solution will make “recording and searching current and historical records quicker, easier and more certain”.

The Treasury also hopes to automate several “time-consuming low-value repeatable tasks”.

The tool should “simplify the digital environment for staff” and “streamline” their paperwork with templates, document generation and automation, the RFQ added.