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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 4 Hansard (6 May) . . Page.. 978 ..

Debate resumed from 10 April 1997, on motion by Mr Stefaniak:

That this Bill be agreed to in principle.

MR BERRY (11.25): The Labor Opposition will be opposing this legislation, for many of the same reasons for which we opposed the amendments to the Public Sector Management Act which were pushed through by the Liberals opposite. We said then, Mr Speaker, that what the proposed changes to the legislation were about was to change the old adage "The buck stops here" to "The buck stops there"; that is, to remove responsibility from Ministers and to place it on the shoulders of public servants, and to put in place a regime which would enable the Government to manipulate the Public Service in a way which we found unacceptable.

I was reading through Hansard, Mr Speaker, and I came across a quote from a speech by Mr Ayers, a notable Commonwealth public servant. He said, according to Hansard:

I dislike the concept of senior executive service officers as political groupies attracted to the light of their own political party like a swarm of bogong moths. If we want a third rate Public Service, the way to achieve it is to politically cleanse the Public Service after each election and put in a new bunch of stooges.

Mr Speaker, on any estimate, I think it can be said that there has been the appearance, anyway, of an unfortunate politicisation of the ACT government service. There have been people coming and going, some inexplicably; but, from the numbers which have come and gone and from the circumstances which gave rise to their going in some cases, one can only be drawn to the conclusion that these people were levered out because they were not able to give advice without fear or favour. That is one of the difficulties which have arisen in relation to this legislation, and I think it is showing itself up in the way our Public Service operates now.

Mr Speaker, to give you an idea of the Government's view then in relation to their proposed legislation - their ideology, as it was at the time - moves had to be taken by this Assembly to take out the provision which would allow a Minister or the Government to remove a person who was employed on the basis that they were incompatible with another person. We all recall that. That should send a signal to anybody who has listened to this debate since it first began that in this Government there is an ideological commitment to the politicisation of the Public Service.

Let me turn now to the CIT Bill. The Government introduced this Bill to change the arrangements under the CIT Act to enable the Minister to appoint the director under terms and conditions consistent with the Public Sector Management Act. I draw that from the short presentation speech. It has not attempted to draw on its view about the amendments to the Public Sector Management Act. All it does, in terms of an argument for these changes, is to say:

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