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Building a better Government

The Honourable Peter Reith MP
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service
Canberra 9 December 1996

THE CHAIRMAN (DR PETER SHERGOLD): Welcome to this lunchtime seminar hosted jointly by the Public Service and Merit Protection Commission and the Department of Industrial Relations. I am Peter Shergold, the Public Service Commissioner. David Rosalky, the Secretary of DIR, will be chairing the session of questions that will follow the presentation.

David and I are delighted to welcome to this seminar the Minister for Industrial Relation and the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service, Peter Reith. This represents the earliest opportunity for the Minister to talk to us at first hand of the significant reforms that he has in mind for the Australian Public Service. I know it has not been easy to arrange his parliamentary schedule to enable this seminar and I very much appreciate the fact that he has done so. In order to extend coverage, the broadcast is going live to some 1000 public servants in 15 locations around Australia. This attendance reflects the enormous interest within the service.

In addition to the thousands of hard copies of the Minister's discussion paper that have been distributed, more than 2000 people have already accessed and downloaded the paper from the PSMPC Home Page on the Internet. I think that the interest is understandable, both within the service and outside. Indeed, no sooner had the Minister achieved success in negotiating legislative support for the enactment of the Workplace Relations Bill, than both he and the media identified Public Service reform in particular and better government in general as the next and equally challenging task. Now, of course many of us feel that we have already been agents of change in the last decade as we have sought to focus the Public Service on results rather than process. But I think many, perhaps most of us, also recognise that in an environment in which we will no longer have a monopoly on the delivery of services to and on behalf of government, we still have a very considerable way to go.

In the broad area of what might be termed people management we continue to be over-legislated, over-regulated and process oriented. All of us have experienced at first hand the costs of inflexibility, whether it is selecting staff, or rewarding them for good performance, whether it is processing pay, or managing performance, whether it is broad banding job classifications, negotiating the best workplace arrangements with one's staff, or deciding on the appropriate SES structure for one's agency there are still too many rules and too little freedom.

If rewriting the legislation and reforming the industrial relations environment can remove the restrictions which encompass us then I am confident that we can change the work structures and systems and most important culture so as to achieve a more rewarding workplace environment and at the same time further improve our productivity, our commitment to service and the quality of the work we perform. The Commission of Audit suggests that as managers we are too risk averse and conservative. Most of us do not want to be that way. The challenge, as the Minister has made clear in his discussion paper, is to do all this while at the same time preserving the values and traditions of public service that we share. That is why the proposed charter of government performance is so important it represents a considerable enhancement of public accountability.

Enough from me. Read the paper, listen to the speech, attend a focus group discussion, but above all let us know what you think. I call upon the Honourable Peter Reith MP to address us now.

THE HON PETER REITH MP: Thank you very much, Peter Shergold, David Rosalky, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. I am very pleased to be here today to address the important issue of public sector reform in the wake of the recent release of a discussion paper on that very subject.

Let me say right at the start that in some senses I think this can be a difficult topic for public discussion. If you pick up the tabloid newspapers in Melbourne and Sydney they will tell you that, in fact, APS reform, or should I say reform of public servants is a half decent sport. In the minds of my political opponents it is all about the demonisation of the service by the government and the pillage of public servants' pay packets. And I suppose for some the topic of public sector reform is simply all about clich*s and not much else.

If I have to confront my political opponents so be it, but please spare me from the cliches of management experts. And let us take the opportunity to talk simply and clearly about the public service and resist the temptation of cliches and superficialities. It think it is very important that the public service and the work that it does is well understood in the wider community and that the wider community understands what it is that the government is proposing and the role that the government sees for the service.

Let me say to respond to the sub-editors of the daily papers, and to our political opponents, that we do not sit around in government plotting how to cut Public Servants' pay packets. Basically, the government's view is that for many in the Public Service they are those who represent pretty well, I think, a cross section of the community and like many others Public Servants are making their way through their working lives doing the best that they can for the people around them and their families and trying to make something of themselves.

Like a lot of other people in the workforce most of them happen to take their jobs pretty seriously. And I think a very large number of them have a very strong sense of working in the service of the nation. And I guess better than some I understand the pure professionalism that the Service can provide. You do not transform the country's industrial relations landscape in 10 months by fiat. You do it by bringing a lot of quality legal and policy resources and good judgement to bear on a process and there has been a lot of that in front of me personally as the Minister for Industrial Relations since 2 March on a daily basis in both my department and in the Public Service and Merit Protection Commission.

So all in all when I read in the local Canberra papers that CPSU delegates are saying and warning of secret agendas and cloaked ideologies and dark horses, I would have to say all I can do is wonder that the government could ever be so organised. The truth is very different. We do have a number of problems with the way in which the Public Service is run but not so as to unfairly criticise managers. I would have to say we have got a few problems with the culture of the Public Service. That anonymous collective psychology out there that none of us are responsible for but for which we are all victims of.

Being the Leader of the House I do not dismiss this phenomenon. We are all victims of behavioural psychology, I can assure you, but I do not want to add to that in my discussion today. I spelled out some of the problems that I see in the Public Service in the discussion paper. Basically, the problems with the Public Service are pretty obvious and I think for today's purposes it is useful to roam a bit widely. To begin with it does cost a great deal of the public's money to administer the Public Service. And I would like to see if we could seriously work together to cut some of those unnecessary costs.

We are burning up millions a year in transaction cost in the Service in some pretty silly work practices and I would like to see those sorted out pretty smartly. I do not want to cut wages, let me repeat, I have said that all along. In fact, I said when we launched the industrial relations reform process and the policy and I want to repeat the same approach in respect of the APS. I cannot see the point in trying to build productivity by undermining the commitment of the very employees who are dependent upon and we are dependent upon to achieve the goal. So this is a two-way process and I understand that. But to be honest, I think it is about time that we made the whole system a bit simpler, a bit smarter and we cashed out and annualised or in some other way simplified the allowances and like. The transaction costs to the public are too great. Yes, there might be some swings and merry-go-rounds in certain areas but I would like to see some of the process-rich nonsense cut out pretty quickly.

Similarly, I would like to be able to engage and promote officers in the APS and deal with matters like poor performance in a professional and modern way. I would like to be able to achieve this with your help and without someone shouting that I am trying to undermine the APS. Simply, the administration and transaction costs and the sheer volume of rules and regulations is stultifying to people in the service. And it is understandably, I think, a red rag to a bull out there in the wider community who see and deal with the seeming subculture that while managing risks for the Government looks for all intents and purposes to be obsessed with process.

This is not the fault of individuals in the APS but a systemic failure which has its primary but not sole causes in the legal framework and the industrial arrangements governing the public service. If you have a look around in the agreement streams in the private sector you will see that there is a rush on to simplify the workplace and get people working together with broader skills and a wider focus on the business. Go to a mining site and you will have trouble working out who drives the trucks, who maintains the equipment and who is the staff. Largely these people work in teams and can dry their hand at a number of jobs.

They are assets for the companies they work for and you will find their wage arrangements reflect a focus on getting the job completed and not about interacting allowances and regulations about the work is to be done, in what hours and in what circumstances. They are interesting and diverse jobs blending an egalitarian way of structuring workplace relationships while simultaneously rewarding individuals who put their heads up a bit from the ruck. All of this is based on light regulation and a hefty dose of trust between everyone involved at the workplace. Now, look, the public service is not akin to a mining operation and I suppose I can see a scribe from the Canberra Times writing under the headline, "Public Service should be like Weipa", says Minister.

I do think there is some analogy and something in that analogy nonetheless. The Government really wants the public service to be a part of the change in the workplace. That is not a revelation, it is evolutionary and it has got to be in the hands of people at work on a day to day basis. I know all the byzantine appeal and grievance procedures and regulations about access to allowances are rationalised in the minds of many on the basis of being entitlements which underpin an apolitical public service which provides fearless and frank advice and so on. I suppose I am going to hear a lot more about this in the discussion process. But are the excesses of the current system sustainable in the modern workplace? I said before that no Government is going to do its job unless it has the professional and skilled support of the public service to assist in the technical development and especially the implementation of its policy. The discussion makes that pretty clear and it makes it clear that some improvements have taken place and I do acknowledge the efforts of so many in recent years to introduce change and an improvement in the operation of the APS.

But the service really does have an obligation - forgetting the views of perhaps the CPSU who seem to me to be arguing for the status quo - the service has an obligation to fix for once and for all the obsession with workplace process issues which distract from the focus on the way in which work is done and the quality of the relationships in the workplace. It just seems to me that the more complex and ingrained the processes which regulate workplace relations becomes, the harder it is going to be to ever break out of the cycle. The cycle is self-perpetuating and employees and managers only speak and communicate through a raft of administrative requirements and regulations. No wonder that in the Kakabadse Report released earlier this year there is a strong indication that managers lack leadership. I have made reference to this in the discussion paper.

It is patently obvious that a government has to do something about this finding and something a little bit more substantive than sending managers away to a retreat to think about themselves. But the managers are not to blame. It is, in my view, not the individuals that we need to be looking at, but in fact the system and this reform is all about the systems that we put in place for the better operation of the APS. In all seriousness there will be no change in the so-called culture of the Public Service until we normalise, if you like, the basis on which people interact in the Public Service.

The more the union and others want to crank up the rules and the regulations, the more chronic these problems will become. And I want to take the opportunity today basically to warn you about this. I do think that for some in the union movement they have an institutional stake in the rules and regulations. In a sense they can be arbiters of it. In a sense it can enfranchise them in the system. And it stops the one thing the unions often do not tolerate and that is public servants like other employees in the community nutting most things out for themselves at the workplace.

There will be have to be distinctive characteristics in the role and function of the APS and the discussion paper clearly conveys that understanding. There will have to be service-wide standards, appropriate accountability machinery and a continuing commitment to core values. But the Public Service has to be in a position to really cherry-pick, if you like, a lot of the best of the private sector experience. I do not want policy advisers in departments to be a business, a going concern, but I do want them to enjoy a number of the basic freedoms and prerogatives and flexibilities that other workers enjoy including cleaner lines of accountability and lighter external regulation.

This would benefit them and it will benefit the Government because they will be more productive and better focused on their workplace duties. And it adds to the quality of the work and the careers which people enjoy in the APS. When I am talking about this I am not revealing a closet agenda to attack rights and to unravel hard won entitlements and drive families out into the snow. But as someone else once said, "I mean what I say and nothing else."

The Government wants the Public Service to be a modern workplace where regulation and prescription are in the back seat and teamwork and professionalism are in the driver's seat. Unions do have an opportunity to help deliver this environment for the benefit of their members. The Government's agenda, as it provides, I think, a new chance, an opportunity for unions to be involved with the support and at the behest of their members. I must say when I read of the CPSU's latest comments I do wonder about the future of that union. Wendy Caird does not have as positive a view about the landscape of the APS that I would hope that the union might have in the future. She did say recently that she saw with the APS today a landscape which will be bleak and inhospitable and an Australia which will be impoverished, and all that as a consequence of the reform paper.

And from what perspective does this arise? By self admission, it arises from a person who confesses to coming from - and I quote again - "the school of dirty realism". Well, I am meeting with the CPSU leadership next week. I look forward to a constructive discussion with them about the future of reform in the APS. I say to them that "Look, the election was over on 2 March". There has been a political debate about the workplace relations bill, but that is now passed through the Senate, and it is time that we sat down and had a sensible discussion about reforms in the APS to the benefit not only of the Government and taxpayers, but most importantly, for the people who work in the APS and for whom it provides an opportunity to serve our nation.

Now, there are, of course, many aspects to that which we are proposing. There are, of course, and have been many studies in the past about the nature of relationships within the APS, some less positive than others. There was one, for example, where an internal study of its employees referred to the priorities of those employees prior to taking leave, seemingly settling the workload or ensuring it was effectively completed or managed in their absence was not there at the top of the list of priorities for such people. Getting the leave work paperwork settled was the priority. Yes, well, I suppose I would have to say I understand that.

We are all paying bills and wondering whether our children will ever understand commercial reality, but why should leave paperwork be an issue, let alone towards the top priority? Look at the discussion paper and you will see the implications of this on a service wide basis. The system should be so simple, but like every other employee, a public servant's entitlements are coolly dealt with as a matter of fact, allowing their focus to be on other matters which are a little bit more related to the job at hand. I suppose that study was a minor issue but it has some poignant symbolism as well. More broadly, my interest in mainstreaming the public service as much as is practicable is not mutually exclusive to its underlying and common-sense values.

Of course I want to see employees treated equitably and fairly in the workplace. The discussion paper recognises this. It is seeking an efficient means of keeping alive the important principles of independence and merit-based appointment, whilst not sliding back into heavy regulation and controls, or worse still, simply substituting old rules for equally convoluted new rules. To get anywhere with this exercise it is necessary to rewrite the Public Service Act so, firstly, you do not have to hire a silk to be able to interpret it.

I am looking for a short piece of legislation which can be readily comprehended by every employee in the service and which spells out what is expected of them and what their rights and responsibilities are. We can set the standards outside the Act by direction and keep agencies and departments on the straight and narrow. This should not be a complicated technical issue. There are plenty of examples of streamlined practices for giving effect to these principles while escaping the worst of the process-driven culture. I look forward to taking advice on these. But I think it is also in part a political issue and I need your help to understand that and to get something in place that is not a political solution, but simply just good practice and let that be the end of it.

The Government also wants to use the public sector reform process as a vehicle to allow individual public servants and teams to have some understanding and recognition in the system. I have been anxious to push this in the departments with which I have immediate and daily contact. In small ways, I suppose I have seen that happening already. While at first as a new minister I dealt with perhaps a relatively narrow number of senior executives supported by a battalion of anonymous helpers and advisers, in recent times as I have become used to my ministerial duties I have found now that we in my office, me personally and those with whom I deal with in a ministerial office, are now interacting with a much wider cross section of individual offices at all levels.

Be it E-mail, phone calls, meetings, written and oral briefings, we have had much more of a one-on-one relationship with a lot more people within the department, perhaps none of whom in the past would have got within a bull's roar of the minister or certainly the minister's office. And certainly I must say from my own experience, that the people I interact with are talented, they are excited by the agenda and are impressively committed to the job. I do not think that the current public service system provides enough basic respect for those who work outside of the SES. I am not sure that their intellectual input and contribution to the processes of government are recognised enough and we should do more to recognise them in the future.

I have not asked David that question, but I think there is more that can be done and I would hope that we can set an example there and encourage others. And I must say, again from my own experience, I have been rewarded by talking to people who exercise good judgement, who are on top of the issues that they have been contacted about, and able to give government good advice. And certainly in the policy area, one cannot ask more of that and that reflects very well on the APS generally. I would like the whole system to open up a bit like this and I would like to give the power to managers to reward some of these people as best they can without creating another layer of administrative complexity.

This is why I happen to think broad banded classification structures, devolution of agency responsibilities in hand with streamlined reporting requirements and maybe a simplified performance payment arrangement could all help. These sorts of initiatives could loosen up the system and mean we could get a genuine and active people-management policy in place at agency level. Buzz words, I suppose they might be, perhaps I have offended my own dicta against clich*s, but we must start dealing with individuals in the system and given them incentives to stay in the service and contribute to it and to current and future governments over their hopefully long careers.

No, this is not some new right agenda, it is not about cutting wages nor exerting some subtle political controls over the system or turning into cunning small business people and women. I will not be merging the Public Service Medal and the Small Business Person of the Year Award, though I would expect both people would be able talk and to understand one another. I recognise that business and government are not one in the same thing. Some people in business think they are. Government may be one of the biggest businesses in the country but it is still not the private sector.

The Government's simple agenda is to open up the system and to let the Public Service labour force have some room to move to create some varied work, to let people work through teams and/or carry individual responsibility and thus obtain recognition and reward for their direct work. This to me, quite frankly, is all common-sense and it will earn the respect of the wider community, I can assure you. But I am not going to accept that can really be achieved by re-badging the past system, and I think you know what I mean. There are some experienced hands out there, who think that all you have to do is change the language and who can sell virtual reality as the real thing.

No-one here today should waste the opportunity afforded by the discussion paper and let continuity outpace change. Last year I heard of a story of a public servant who lodged an unlawful termination application, filed for damages on grounds of having been employed as a public servant. That is, his career had been irreparably damaged because he had been a public servant. Well, let us put those days behind us, nothing more than an historical anecdote, rather oddly at that. Unlike some, I am very optimistic about the future of the service.

My own experience, I think you would gauge from what I have said, has been with the Department of Industrial Relations and the PSMPC, and both have given me some real confidence that the system can serve the interests of employees and not be simply self serving. But as I said earlier, if you want to open up your work places in the terms which I am outlining, then you are just going to have to push hard, as I am prepared to do. You are going to have to put in your penny's worth in the consultation period, hit the E-mail. You are going to have to tell your union to represent your views and not its interests, and whilst you are at it I think some might even let some of the minority senators have an appreciation of the broader within the APS about reform.

Now, I would have to say we are not always going to be in agreement. Probably at the margins more often at not, but if I were you I would not let this chance slip by. Some of you may well hanker life pre-March 1996, but at least I am going to give you an opportunity to say something about how you think your workplace should change and why. In the past I think too often it was settled in political offices by unions and a couple of ministers.

If I could just turn to some other matters I know are especially contentious in the Public Service. The role of Australian workplace agreements and the basis of making agreements in the future. Of course, the CPSU keeps saying that we are putting everyone onto individual contracts, which will rob your pay packet, take the job or take the same principles to apply, and so on. The unions keep repeating this. The CPSU thinks that if you say it often enough, people will start to believe it. Well, you should not believe it because these are baseless claims. Australian workplace agreements are agreements. They cannot be forced on anyone. They are enforceable at law and enforcement can be free through the office of the employment advocate. AWAs can offer no less than the relevant Federal Award, they cannot be discriminatory, they are pre-vetted by a third party. In my view AWAs will have a role in the public service where the fit a need, especially where there is some differentiated work that is better covered and organised by a discretely tailored arrangement. Possibly there will be demand for AWAs in agencies where there are peaks and troughs of employment but then again, maybe not. Maybe AWAs could be a useful means for codifying the duties, responsibilities and terms of employment of SES personnel. If so, well and good. It would add transparency to the terms of their appointment.

For the most part I can happily envisage collective arrangements prevailing in the public service. Be they in the form of union based certified agreements or agreements made directly between employers and employees at agency level.

I am in favour of giving agencies and departments the right to branch out on their own to the extent they want and create their own working arrangements. As long as the system we put in place allows for agencies and departments to get what they want out of the system, I believe it will be a better system. I am not prescriptive about it. I have consistently said that the Workplace Relations Act was a piece of enabling legislation purposefully designed on the single premise that it was meant to provide parties an opportunity to take what they want from it. I for one am not in the business of running around counting AWAs or in the case of my predecessor, counting certified agreements. I do not share the previous government's interest in blueprints and central planning. With a comprehensive safety net in place which bears on wages and anti-discrimination matters and within a Public Service Act which embodies the elemental principles which embody the public service, I expect the total system to be an amalgam of arrangements reflecting local as well as service-wide needs.

In terms of how the agreement stream will interact with the APS I suspect that there will be agencies running ahead of the pack, there will be late starters and others which will sit pat for whatever reason and draw on service-wide type arrangements. These matters are yet to be settled but as another basic principle, I fully intend to create a bargaining framework in which departments and agencies, subject to the parameters set by the Public Service Act, can express their own interests and character as they need. I just happen to think that you can get a simpler system that melds common sense values of the public service with more open ended industrial arrangements.

The critics think in silos and typologies, dichotomies and characters and it is about time you called them out on this one. I know you are all interested in the issue of change of functions across the public service. To some extent the discussion paper on APS reform has this as a backdrop and across them and I do need to acknowledge this. But it is not a discrete area of portfolio responsibility as you know. The paper deals with the APS and not the wider public sector, which is closer to the market. Notwithstanding this, I do appreciate the process of globalisation has reached into agencies and departments and will no doubt extent its influence regardless of what I do and what the Government does to help you all to respond to these changes.

Globalisation hit the rural, the clothing and the automotive industries pretty hard but I think it is now much wider than that and quite pervasive. Governments all around the world are looking at implementing ways to get services out to clients more efficiently and at improved levels of performance. A few short years ago I could not get Telecom to give me an account confirmation, now I am reluctant to answer the phone at night for fear it is a Telstra or Optus operator asking me if I am happy with my service and if I would like some newer value added service in the future. And I suppose after July of 1997 they will not be ringing, they will be calling.

Have a look at the dairy and the fruit industries and the extraordinary product differentiation that is sitting on the supermarket shelves these days. Behind this is a massive transformation of industries and a wholly new pattern of capital mobilisation. Or, I think the truth of the matter is that we are in the big league, we are going to have to be in it in a big way and we are going to have to be innovative and prepared to take on the challenges that this presents. Competition and globalisation has brought multi-media communications technology and these, in turn are changing internal public service processes and to be sure, I think the same focuses and forces are changing how services are delivered. Now, people can complain about this or they can constructively contribute to the processes and link their skills with the times.

What the upshot of all this will be at the end of the day for public service functions and particularly so in service delivery areas I think is going to be guided by it, from the Government's point of view, will be guided by practical judgement and experience. There cannot be a sort of Laurie Carmichael type blue print in central planning exercises and I do not think we can have an ideological view to dealing with these issues and certainly we will not be, on the Government's part. In conclusion I today wanted to give you a bit of a feeling for the context of the APS reform and the discussion paper which we have issued to stimulate conversation and response.

It is about the livelihood of many thousands of Australians, about the livelihood of people who work in the APS and about the quality of your professional lives and I would hope that you will take a very constructive interest in it. This consultation period does not go on forever, I am afraid, so instead of leaving your workplace relations to the industrial parties I say to people, "Get behind your PCs. Tap out the message and make a positive contribution. Be frank and fearless, please, but be clear about what you want and what the problems are, as you see them." I have tried, today, to talk simply about my views because, to be honest, I do not believe in this business of talking in code or using language evasively but if you could make a constructive comment, even if on selected matters only or matters the discussion paper has overlooked, then that would be of great value.

I would also like people to speak with their own voices and not that of a union or otherwise, not that there is anything wrong with doing so but it is most important that people's personal views are in fact put forward. In a small country like Australia it is one of the - and it is an odd thing about the political process that many people feel disenfranchised, many people, and perhaps people in the APS feel distant from the political process and yet not realising the opportunities are simply there on a day by day basis to pick up the phone and have your point of view and I say, here it is, please take up the opportunity, it is very important that we have the benefit of the views of those who work within the system.

I suppose I am a bit disappointed by some who say that we do not provide enough time for consultation who say that we ought to have a pre consultation consultation process with the unions first. Well, I think that is a bit pythonesque. As I say, the election campaign is over. The workplace relations political debate is over. Let us now sit down and have a sensible discussion about the future of the APS. I do think that the CPSU needs to get over its political disappointments. And if it does not, then I think - not that it is going to risk anything with me - the reality is that if it does not get over its political disappointments, I think it is going to risk its own relationship with its own membership, and that, of course, must be something which is important to the union in the future. I suppose ultimately public service reform is about basic relationships of trust and open communications at the work place level.

So let us not have too much management speak and cliches. If you like, forget the parameters of the discussion paper and the language as well. Just say what you want to say and say what you mean. And I hope that I have managed to do a bit of that today that encourages an open process in the months ahead, and I look forward with great interest to the contributions of people throughout the APS to ensuring that in the future we work to improve the APS for those who work within it, for those who on a daily basis need an efficient APS to deliver the services that are required, and lastly to the tax payer who funds the process. Thank you very much.

DR DAVID ROSALKY: Thank you very much, Minister. You have time, I believe, for a few questions. What you have presented to us, both in your discussion paper and in your speech today, obviously has far reaching consequences for all of us who are part of the Government process, but also those who interact with Government. So I am sure there are questions that people would like to ask you from the audience, and I will ask people now to indicate that interest. There are microphones placed in the centre of the hall, so could I please ask whether people have questions to ask of the minister.

MR REITH: Or if there are not any questions, I would be happy to take a comment, if I could throw that in, Dr Rosalky.

DR DAVID ROSALKY: Sorry, I missed a person behind the cameras here, but there is a lady who would like to ask a question.

MS GILLIAN BOSTON: Thank you, I am Gillian Boston. I think the Senator suggested that public servants are risk averse. I wondered if you could tell us what the liability for risk is that currently accrues to the Commonwealth, and why he thinks it is too low, and what he thinks it ought to be? Thank you.

MR REITH: Well, I think what I said was that there is that public perception that, instead of taking a risk, people are - that the APS sometimes falls too quickly back to process. Now, it is a fine balance, I must say, because, you know, it is one thing to make the point, it is another thing to be realistic for those who are responsible for making decisions appreciating that you might have to front up before some Senate committee and be asked a series of questions from some Senator, which you wonder whether or not it bears anything to do with reality in terms of the, you know, perhaps the amounts involved and the decision that has been taken.

So I appreciate there is a balance there to be made. I do also appreciate that this is one of the differences between public service, one of a number of differences, but one of the differences between public service and private sector management and the operation of the system. So I think it is a balance to be had. I think the politicians have a responsibility to, you know, to draw the line more equitably and more fairly than what they have in the past. I do not have an immediate resolution to that, but I think it is a perception around. It is not just a function of the operations of the APS, though it is a function of the political system, and I accept the responsibility that politicians have had, you know, in that in the past.

DR DAVID ROSALKY: Thank you. A gentleman with another question, thank you.

MR GORDON BIRCH: Just inquiring. There is no closing date in the actual paper for the submissions and I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about the further processes of consultation as the Government reaches its final view?

MR REITH: I am not sure if we have got a date - I think we do have a date actually, at the end of January or early February.

DR SHERGOLD: We want responses by the end of January. There are focus group sessions being arranged around the country. And for everybody who is here who is interested in participating in a session, we would like you to inform us through the PSMPC. And for people who are receiving the broadcast live, you will find that at the end of the program is the internet address and what you want to do if you wish to participate in a focus group.

MR REITH: Can I just add to that and say in addition, look, if we are swamped by submissions and that means that we have got to spend a bit more time going through the submissions, well, quite frankly, that is what we will do. I do not think this process cannot be subject to some arbitrary time limit. When I say we want to have genuine consultation that is exactly what I mean and I can assure you we intend to have it. So, yes, there is a date. Thank you, and I dare say Dr Shergold with have words with me after for suggesting that we could extend the date, but, no, the consultation is genuine and let us make sure that we hear what people have got to say.

DR ROSALKY: Further questions or comments?

MR REITH: Whilst the question is being thought of, we do want to have the Public Service Act legislation in the Parliament during next year and we would like to see it through by the end of next year. So we have that a s goal ahead of us and so there is some need to press on, but, as I say, we do not want to have arbitrary time limits on it.

MR COWEN: David Cowen is my name. I am wondering if you would give us some comments on what prospects of success you have to getting the legislation through the Senate given the comments that have been reported about opposition from the Opposition, the Greens and the Democrats.

MR REITH: I must say, I do not have a sort of political assessment at this point in time of reactions within the Senate to the proposed legislation. There is work being done on the legislation, I suppose, going back since to the time of McLeod and obviously we now have a new context for that legislation so there is a fair bit to be done and obviously we will not know the shape of that legislation until we have been through the consultation process. So I have not as yet had an opportunity to sit down with Senator Kernot. She is probably dreading the though of another 50 hours with me. So at this stage I think it is too early and I do not pre-empt the views of the Opposition senators. I have learnt not to do that.

I would hope that we would get some positive support from the non-Government senators when we finally put together the package, but, as I say, it is too early. I actually think though that what will partly affect that, I think, is the views of the APS generally, if that can be in some way crystallised in the times ahead. I suppose the fact is the CPSU will have a strong influence on some of the non-Government senators, but I would hope that ordinary rank and file members, shall we say, will also have an opportunity to be heard and it will be interesting to see how these views develop.

MR RODEN: Mr name is David Roden. Minister, you talk about the need to reduce process and yet, it seems to me, right throughout the world there is an increase in the role of both parliamentary and extra parliamentary accountability bodies. How do you see that tension being dealt with?

MR REITH: Well, that is true. I think it was part of the flavour of the first question I got as well and I am not sure that I - well, in fact, look, I do not come here with a simple answer to it. I am not sure there is one. I genuinely say to you I am quite interested to hear how people in the APS feel about that issue and how they think it ought to be resolved. I mean, obviously transparency and accountability are terribly important concepts within the democratic system of government that we have and no one, in any sense, puts those things to one side. At the same time, we do not want to be so bound up by process that we give ourselves the inefficiencies and inflexibilities that I think do characterise some parts of the operation of the APS today.

So, I just genuinely say to you I have got a pretty open mind about that. I would have to say too though I suppose that my view is that you can have a lot less process than what we have got today and still have a very accountable system and I do, let me emphasise the point I made earlier too in response to the first question and that is that look, I am well aware that the politicians have a role in this. You know, if you have sort of an excessive view about trivia then obviously you are going to get a reaction from those who provide the service to government and to the parliament in responding to such requests for information and such political pursuits so I think it is a balance to be found.

DR ROSALKY: Yes, I might make this the last question because the minister does have commitments.

MS P. WEIR: Mr Reith, I am just interested in taking up some of your comments about the role of the CPSU in change agendas. I have just completed a major process improvement project in my agency around personnel services and in fact at the work place level what I have found is that the CPSU, having been taken into account as the major stakeholder and working with them through processes, have been more supportive of the kind of changes in the ways of operating than some perhaps middle and senior level management given that a lot of what we are doing is actually acquiring different ways for people to operate. I am just wanting to share that experience, I guess, and also seek your comments or observations on that.

MR REITH: Well, thank you for saying that. Look, I must say as far as the CPSU is concerned, other unions within the public service are concerned generally I am more than happy to sit down and talk with them and I am genuinely interested in what they have got to say. I would have to say I do not think our relationship with the CPSU has got off to a flying start. I mean, I think at their first executive meeting they were passing motions that they were going to run campaigns against the newly elected government. I have had a couple of meetings with them. They had basically been at a fairly political and rhetorical level.

I suppose what I am saying is I sort of expect some of that, to a certain point in time, but I think the time has come when some of that has got to be put to one side. Now, I would contrast that with the ACTU. I mean, you could appreciate I do not have, you know, a close affinity with the objectives of the ACTU but I would have to also say to you that with the Workplace Relations Bill we sat down in the committee on industrial legislation with the ACTU and the ACCI- it is a sub-committee of the National Labor Consolidative Committee. We had about 20, or 25 hours going through the Workplace Relations Bill and for all that was said publicly and the rhetorical sort of contest that was going on, we actually had a very constructive discussion with them and quite frankly, that is all I am asking of the CPSU, that we have a sensible - I do not mind if it is - you know, I do not mind if there is a public campaign against us, I am used to that.

This, quite frankly, is sort of par for the course but ultimately I would like at some stage, even if it is behind closed doors, to be able to have a constructive relationship with any union representing people in the APS. I mean, people are entitled to be in a union, they are entitled to have their point of view represented by the union and they are entitled to expect us to have a positive approach to talking to them.

Now, I do not think unions are the be all and end all and obviously my view is that if you do not want to be in a union you do not have to be and if you are not in the union I also think that your point of view is entitled to be heard. So, I would hope, and time will tell, but we are meeting with the CPSU and I suppose whilst there is some criticism in my tone about the CPSU I would hope that they also appreciate that there is a genuine attitude on our part to sit down and talk with them and I think if people can do that usually you can sort out a lot of problems.

We will not agree on a lot of things but I think there are some sensible things that can be done and I welcome your anecdotal contribution that they have been more supportive in some areas than even some who have the responsibility to be supportive; ie some managers, no disrespect to any managers in the hall and let us face it that can be the same, I would have to say in my experience in the private sector as well. I could tell you of certain circumstances in the private sector where the union has been more progressive than the middle order management of some of our big companies which are pretty archaic in some of their approaches. So, thank you for your contribution.

DR ROSALKY: Well, Minister, let me thank you very much for delivering to us a challenge to bring about a new public service that will certainly take us into the new millennium. It is not very often you can actually use that phrase and I do not, I guess, think that any reform is actually going to last a millennium, but there is no doubt that the far reaching nature of this will take us well into the years of that millennium. The size and the broad range of backgrounds of this audience, both in Canberra and throughout the country demonstrates a great interest in the important role of the public sector, as you said in your address, in adding value to the Australian community by adding value to the business of government.

I think we are being given a great opportunity here, both to offer comments on how we think this matter might develop for us, but also to contribute to the process of reform itself and the title of the speech that you delivered, I believe, has a key message in it, that is a process about building a new service, a service that will cope with the changes in the way we do business, changes that have become for us an imperative.

The agenda for the next 12 months certainly is a challenging one. Firstly, of course, there is the process of preparing contributions, comments and ideas to the debate on the discussion paper and I think that is something that a range of agencies throughout the public service are already preparing and doing some thinking about, but also for 1997 we have the introduction of the new workplace relations legislation which will be a major area of reform and a major topic of interest for the service. And, of course, we also have the expiry at the end of this calendar year of the present service-wide APS agreement and we will need to settle new enterprise bargaining arrangements for the service in the new year.

I think those challenges that we see in the next 12 months that is really only the first stage of process for us. Our challenges certainly will continue. We, in the Public Service, have discussed and I guess we have developed various aspects of reform over past years. But there are very key differences in the program ahead of us. Differences, for example, in the extent and prominent purpose of your government's agenda. The significant thrust that we all feel of making our services contestable and accountable.

The clear and continuing pressures to use all of our resources to the best possible value. And most importantly, I believe, a whole new framework for the workplace introduced in the Workplace Relations Act, a workplace in which we will have to embed our services reforms.

So let me come to a conclusion, firstly, by thanking everybody here on behalf of the Minister and Peter Shergold as a co-host, the Public Service and Merit Protection Commission team and myself and DIR's team to thank everybody here and who have listened to this broadcast throughout the country and to, this late of the year, to wish you a happy and safe festive season and a happy and very challenging 1997. But to you, Minister, I thank you again for your presentation today and for the frank and thought provoking comments that you have made. Thank you very much.

Ministerial speeches and media releases - Archive

Building a better Government

The Honourable Peter Reith MP Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service Canberra 9 December 1996

The Honourable Peter Reith MP
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service
Canberra 9 December 1996