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Email sent 10 March 2008
Ms Madonna King,
Courier Mail
Getting More from the Public Service
I should like to provide
feedback concerning a recent article, in which you lamented the lack of
contribution to national policy innovation and other deficiencies currently
associated with Public Services.
My interpretation of your article:
Problems in the Wollongong City Council demonstrates
both the power of public servants, and the scope for misbehaviour.
But state and federal public services are also susceptible to a lack of
accountability and biased decision making. The
Prime Minister has suggested that the
public service is not the brains trust of national innovation. But
it should be, given its huge resources. Innovative and creative
suggestions should be its core role. This is impossible while senior
positions are politicised, and DGs provide ministers with advice they
expect to hear, rather than independent counsel. In Queensland, DGs are on
contracts, and able to be dismissed with four weeks notice. Public service
advice to ministers is always secret - but should be publicly accessible.
This won't happen while it is assumed that good ideas have to be dreamed
up in ministers' offices. If the public service were genuinely apolitical
(which would firstly require fixed term contracts,
and that removal required reasons which were subject to judicial review)
then there would be no need for
Kevin Rudd's 2020 summit. The combined brains of those in departments
like Queensland Treasury and
Education should allow innovative policies to emerge. But their ideas are
never heard, because everything focuses on elected governments. The
problem could be fixed by (a) making public servants accountable (through
secure tenures and publishing their advice) and (b) expecting public
servants to help develop policy rather than merely implement it (King M.,
'Rot sets in with Yes Minister',
Courier Mail, 8-9/3/08)
The issues that your article
raised are important - and complex. I should like to submit for your
consideration, that:
-
the problem in Wollongong
City Council that your article referred to probably does not have just have
a Public Service origin (see attached email, Detoxifying NSW Labor, which
includes reference to an article by a NSW observer);
-
politicisation of public
services probably makes them more likely to countenance corruption (eg Davis
B., `Public Service Culture May Foster Fraudsters', Australian,
24/7/95). Queensland does not seem to be immune from this disease any more
than Western Australia has been and New South Wales now seems to be (see
Reform of Queensland Institutions - or a Rising Tide of
Public Hypocrisy?);
-
as your article noted,
politicisation adversely affects the ability of Public Services to
contribute to policy development (eg because it eliminates knowledge and
skills whose importance was not recognised, and results dominance by 'yes
men'). It also inhibits effective implementation - see
The Growing Case for a Professional Public
Service; and
On Populism;
-
while the Prime Minister is
correct in suggesting that the Public Service can not be the brains trust of
national innovation, ideas that a formulated without its input are certain
to be inadequate - and this is one of the reasons that the 2020 Summit is
likely to be ineffective (see
Talkfest
Magic?). However, as the latter commentary
suggests, generating the ideas that are the basis for 'national innovation'
requires many different types of support to the political system - not just
a more effective Public Service. Moreover, ideas are 'a dime a dozen' and
are seldom the key factor in innovation. In commercial innovation, for
example, it is understanding of the practical / market relevance of new
ideas and the skills to manage implementation which are 95% of the problem;
-
in Queensland, though most
of the damage to the Public Service was done
under the Goss Government (see
Outline of the History of the Westminster Tradition's
Breakdown), politicisation of the Public Service
has long had bipartisan support (see Queensland's
Opposition seems Equally Guilty), [Other documents
which have addressed this issue are in a
Chronological Summary
on my web-site];
-
ensuring that Public
Services have the competence to give worthwhile independent counsel to
elected governments about potential policy innovations requires an
independent system of professional accountability which is not subject to
political manipulation (eg see
The Effect of Public Service
Politicisation which suggested why it would
not be not feasible for non-experts [including the judiciary] to
evaluate the adverse effect of politicisation). The Goss Government set
up very elaborate procedures to promote 'merit and equity' in Public Service
appointments, but these were a farce because they were not built on any
repository of professionalism (eg knowledge about what professional 'merit'
actually was). In fact legislation was enacted to make it unnecessary to
seriously consider merit in making 'senior' appointments - presumably to
protect the inexperienced political favourites who were installed in those
positions (see
email, 10/4/04)
Good luck in your further pursuit of this important question.
Regards
John Craig
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Attachment |
Email sent 4/3/08
Professor Peter Botsman
Detoxifying NSW Labor
Thanks for your email of
4/3/08 which linked to a paper (De-Toxifying
NSW Labor) that outlined problems in the NSW ALP and also suggested
possible solutions.
The problems which you
identify internally within the ALP (ie politicisation of administration,
centralization of control and a tendency towards 'crony capitalism') are
little different to those being experienced by state governments.
In Queensland, for example,
the Goss administration (in which the current Prime Minister had a central
role) politicised administration and centralised control in an effort to
ensure that its agenda could be followed, and ultimately achieved almost
nothing apart from leaving its successors with unworkable machinery of
government (see
Queensland's Worst Government?).
And, as in Western Australia, those with good political connections seem
increasingly to be exploiting their positions for personal profit (see
Reform of Queensland Institutions - or a Rising Tide of Public
Hypocrisy?). And, for some, a career in 'public
administration' became the preferred pathway to political advancement.
Your reform proposals for the
NSW ALP might be enhanced by giving more consideration to the environmental
changes which have caused difficulties for democratic governance generally -
which may be along the lines speculated in
Challenges to Australia's Democratic Institutions.
A core point is that complexity seems to be overwhelming those institutions,
and they have reacted by over-simplifying issues and thus losing their ability
to deal with them effectively. Over-simplification is reflected in both
politicisation and centralization of control.
Solutions speculated in the
latter reference involve developing stronger supports to the political system
to enable it to cope better with complexity. Simply trying to 'democratise'
ALP machinery in NSW without boosting the ability of such political
institutions to cope with complexity is likely to be ineffective.
Regards
John Craig
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