Page 859 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 20 March 2019
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they are currently being shown. Any efforts towards decentralisation should be driven by the needs and wants of each government agency and especially their workers, not some vague political objective.
The Greens are pleased to support this motion today and trust that our colleagues on the hill will pay some attention to it.
MR PETTERSSON (Yerrabi) (3.48): I am disappointed that I am back in this chamber to speak yet again about the Liberal-Nationals obsession with decentralisation. I wish it were not so, but yet again we are seeing another swag of jobs being pork-barrelled to Liberal and Nationals electorates at the expense of Canberra and the national interest.
Canberra as a city was created by the federal government as the nation’s meeting place. The aim was to bring together not only our parliamentary representatives but our bureaucracy to foster a culture of public service and the national interest, and this approach has served Australia well. Our public service does a great job.
Instead of attacking and undermining our public service, we should celebrate our public service. Public servants go to work every day to help our nation. They help us come together. Sadly, it is only when Liberal and Nationals politicians get involved that we see their great work undermined. We see public servants becoming punching bags for conservative talking points and we see their work demonised.
The motion before us is straightforward, in my opinion: we are calling out pork-barrelling. Their pork-barrelling is forcing Canberra public servants into an impossible choice. You can move to Murray Bridge in South Australia or else. Good luck if your partner has a job in Canberra and cannot move. Good luck if you have children in schools here. Good luck if you have built a life here. You have to take your chances in Murray Bridge.
The contempt the Liberal-Nationals have for our public service is visible in more than one way. Not only do the Liberals try to pork-barrel public servants but they also seek to politicise them. The Liberals devalue the public service by creating politicised agencies like the ROC and the ABCC. I note they did not set up these agencies in Murray Bridge or Griffith. It seems to me they know that the public service operates best from central locations. Maybe it is harder to leak information about imminent police raids from rural South Australia.
The public service is further devalued when you have former Liberal MPs in government positions giving private travel companies access to public servants, all the while preparing to bid for a government contract. I speak of course about the Hello World scandal involving former Treasurer Joe Hockey. The fact that this company is a major donor to the Liberal Party is apparently neither here nor there, as the meeting occurred just outside some tender window. I am sure the losing parties feel it is all very fair and above board for their competitor to use Liberal Party contacts to get the inside word on government money.
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