Page 1946 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 16 June 1993
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management change, driving organisational and structural change and the like, to the extent that it is happening within the public sector. This does not allow us to know what the people within the OPSM specifically felt about these matters; they are just obscured within the figures. But perhaps it says something about the broader organisation as well. I think that is something the Assembly ought to be interested in.
I must say that I was a bit perplexed that this matter was being discussed as a matter of public importance. It deals with only one organisation of about 300 people in an ACT Government Service of 23,000. Just how big that makes it in terms of public interest, of public importance, I am not sure. It certainly is a matter that we as members of this Assembly ought to be concerned about, and perhaps we should have been discussing it in some other context, but as to the extent to which it is a matter of public importance I am not sure.
From the Chief Minister's remarks, the next step that would logically flow from this has not yet been taken; that is, to decide what needs to be done to rectify the matters that are brought out in this report, to the extent that they are adverse.
Mr Stevenson: Seven months on?
MR KAINE: To develop a program. You could argue that it is taking too long; that is a matter of opinion. I come back to just how important it is in the context not only of all of the things the Government is doing but also of what the public service is doing. I would like to see some results, to the extent that there are things that do not look too good on the face of it. Perhaps the Chief Minister could have told us what programs they are setting in place, what their timescale is, and when they expect to have them finished. She did say that there would be a further survey in November. That seems a long time into the future to do another survey and see whether there has been some improvement or not; but, hopefully, something is happening.
I think you have to ask the questions: How much did it cost to conduct this survey and, at the end of the day, was it cost-effective? Were there beneficial changes that flowed from it that at least recouped or more than recouped the cost of doing it in the first place? That is a question I would ask the Chief Minister to comment on when next we hear a report about this. The final point is that the Chief Minister has indicated that this was a pilot survey. That implies that this is going to be done elsewhere in the public sector. Is there a program for doing this, and who is next? Is the Health Department going to be next or is Mr Wood's Education Department? Is it going to be the entire organisation or only one small part of it, as this is only one small part of the Chief Minister's entire area of responsibility?
It is those questions that flow from this that are rather more important than the report itself. I would hope that, before this debate is concluded, somebody on the Government side might answer those questions, so that at least we can be satisfied that something good is flowing from all of this. Rather than just looking at the adverse comment that is made in it - and there is some - let us see where it is going to lead and how it is going to improve the performance of the public service. If the Chief Minister or somebody else over there can convince me that there is something positive flowing from it, I would to some degree abstain from Mr Stevenson's criticism of the Chief Minister as a manager and perhaps also the higher management of this organisation. I think the survey has to pay off, and that means that management has to do something positive as a result of it.
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