At a Senate Estimates hearing into AWI in Canberra this week, a blowtorch was shone on the role of the taskforce, its management and the cost to run it.

NSW Liberal Senator, Bill Heffernan, questioned AWI representatives on the actions of the taskforce in responding to the boycott of Australian wool by retailers in Sweden, with members being flown to Europe without the knowledge of the AWI board.

Senator Heffernan also drilled down into to whom the taskforce members actually reported and what sort of budget they worked with.

"I would like to know who the hell they report to," Senator Heffernan asked.

After a long-winded response, AWI board member Chris Abell said the taskforce largely reported to AWI "in terms of justifying its costs and its funding".

"But its structural side was still as originally set up, and it was set up to represent the peak bodies in the wool industry," he added.

"The secretarial services are run at the moment by AWI and AWI is taking an increasing role in the activities and the management of the task force."

But Senator Heffernan continued, saying "there is no-one running the bloody thing" and "we cannot measure the outcome".

"It just seems to me that we ought to shut it down," Senator Heffernan said.

"It just seemed to me that they were out of their space when they went to Europe and I just cannot believe that the board was not fully informed…"

Dr Abell said the task force activities were under substantial review at the moment "so that is changing".

He said the decision to send taskforce members to Sweden without informing all AWI board members "was an oversight at the time".

"There are practices in place to stop that now," he said.

"At the time of the situation in Sweden, when retailers started objecting to Australian wool, and that blew up, there were some difficulties with communication and some of us knew about it, some of us didn't.

"It happened very rapidly and it was considered very important that the taskforce reacted very quickly."