Page 1920 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 14 June 1994
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Let us have a look at some of the questions that this committee - had it had a lot longer time - would have asked. What should the Public Sector Management Bill be seeking to achieve, and why? What are the likely outcomes of the Bill? What public sector structure is most likely to achieve the goals identified, and why? How do those goals compare with the Bill? What structures are other public services putting in place? We all know what South Australia and the Northern Territory have recommended - something totally different to what is recommended in this Bill.
Mr Kaine: Have a look at New Zealand.
MR DE DOMENICO: Mr Kaine intervenes to mention New Zealand. Perhaps we should have a greater look at events there. Does the Bill encourage the provision of flexible job structures to promote the achievement, for example, of the International Year of the Family objectives? Have we had time to have a look at that properly? Who should be covered by the Bill, and why? We have before us some evidence as to who believes that they should not be covered by the Bill, but have we had time to really look into that properly?
Does the Bill, as it stands, help agency managers to do their jobs more effectively? I can recall having heard time and time again in South Australia and in the Northern Territory, "Do not centralise everything. Do not do it. Let managers manage. Give them the flexibility to make their own decisions. Do not be too bureaucratic, because bureaucracy is tedious and is not flexible". We need to have a flexible approach because we have a flexible responsibility - both a State government-type responsibility and a local government responsibility.
There are other questions that the committee, had it had time, should have asked itself. What processes of evaluation and review should be put in place to assess performance and ensure accountability to the public, for whose well-being the public service exists? I think this Government, more than any other government, should realise how important accountability is. We will be debating that more tomorrow, I dare say. What are other public services doing to encourage agencies to be responsive and innovative and to strive for excellence in serving the public?
I suppose that if we had time to assess all these questions we might be able to come up with some answers. Certainly, on my very brief reading of the 200 pages of this supposedly perfect piece of legislation - and I still have not had a chance to get to the 109 amendments that we saw for the first time at a quarter past six on Friday night - it is not flexible; it is not innovative. As Mr Kaine says, the Government seems to have plagiarised great heaps and wads of old Federal Public Service Acts and put them all together in a hotchpotch sort of way, and the Chief Minister has said, "Here it is. I have a timetable that I must now insist on, which is 1 July 1994. Mind you, I have had nearly three years to get the act together, but I have not".
I could be so bold as to suggest that part of the reason for this whole situation is that some of the promises that were made 18 months ago obviously cannot be delivered. It got to the farcical stage that the only way we could get a better deal for ACT public servants was for Mrs Carnell and Mr Kaine to go up the hill and persuade the Opposition and the Democrats to make amendments to the Federal Act that the Chief Minister herself
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