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Probe into raid on WA firm

Probe into raid on WA firm

The Commonwealth Ombudsman will investigate the Agriculture Department over its bungled quarantine investigation into a small WA biotech company.

But the probe could come too late to save the Bunbury business, with the owners complaining the department's prosecution of the case irreparably damaged its reputation and relations with customers and suppliers.

Serana was raided by Department of Agriculture officials after allegations it had imported bovine serum from a country not cleared of foot-and-mouth disease.

The company's entire stock of serum was seized and quarantined, effectively putting the business in limbo.

But in a blow to the department's case, the Federal Court found in February the warrant for the raid was likely to have been issued unlawfully. It ordered the company's stock be returned immediately.

In a letter seen by _The West Australian _, lawyers for Serana claim department investigators had an "informant" who was employed by GE Healthcare - a competitor of the Bunbury company.

In Parliament this month, WA Labor MP Alannah MacTiernan claimed that once the department "pushed Serana on the ropes", GE Healthcare systematically set about approaching Serana's suppliers and entered into contracts to take its serum.

In a letter to Ms MacTiernan, the ombudsman's office said it had completed an initial assessment and agreed to investigate the department's handling of the case.

"We will be asking the department about how it conducted its investigation into Serana and how it made its decisions to seek a search warrant and to withhold the serum," the ombudsman said.

The ombudsman cannot compel the department to do anything but can recommend action.

The department opened its own investigation into how sensitive Serana documents seized in the raid came to be shown to its suppliers.

Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce has insisted his department did nothing wrong and the tip-off did not come from GE Healthcare.