PM Tony to shift your job north of the 20th parallel?

Samuel Gordon-Stewart said :

For the record, I support spreading the public service out across the entire country, not just the north, although I think the north would benefit the most at this point in time from some economic development which would result from a bunch of extra people suddenly living there….

Yeah, we got that impression last time.

As mezza said:”Why is economic activity in Canberra [considered] worse than economic activity in Cairns? Why should the country spend considerable funds moving this economic activity from one location to another? There is no net benefit to the consumer [i.e Australia overall, which the Federal govt would be focused on – not one or two jurisdictions].”

Further, you mentioned in your original tome: “but the public service does not exist to keep Canberra economy ticking over”.
So, how does that fit with: “I think the north would benefit the most at this point in time from some economic development which would result from a bunch of extra people suddenly living there”.
i.e What if we replace ‘Canberra’ in your first quote with ‘Cairns’? Basically, you’re confusing me! Then again, i’m a bit simple!

Samuel Gordon-Stewart said :

For the record, I support spreading the public service out across the entire country, not just the north, although I think the north would benefit the most at this point in time from some economic development which would result from a bunch of extra people suddenly living there.

But it doesn’t. They aren’t ‘extra’ people…they are people moving from one economic area to another. So unless they are all unemployed to begin with – you’re not ‘creating’ anything. You are simply removing economic activity from one area to another.

On the other issues – it’s not about public servants in Canberra understaning ‘Canberra’ issues. It’s about taking a ‘national’ view. I don’t need to be in a frick’n flood to know it’s bad. But I need to know the issues around it – how to get quick income support, repairing critical infrastructure, immediate housing and sanitation needs, ensuring good governance and law and order. We’re people with a diverse background, skills and experiences. We’re not just a bunch of characters from Yes Minister.

In that context, do you think that the best people to plan fuding and investment for developing countries aid money, is the developing countries themselves? Or do you think that developed countries/specially equipped aid organisations are better placed do that?

I think I’ll politely ‘beg to differ’. And for the record, most people in the public service don’t like MOG changes, reshuffles and restructures. All of which are created by bad management, politics or both. I hope one day we’ll make it a referendum to change departments – thereby taking it out of government’s crazy hand to stack every minority issue into the title of a department (see The Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities)

For the record, I support spreading the public service out across the entire country, not just the north, although I think the north would benefit the most at this point in time from some economic development which would result from a bunch of extra people suddenly living there.

In regards to having departments closer to their clients, obviously it’s not applicable or appropriate for all departments, but there are some where it makes sense. With other departments, where there may not be a best strategic place for them to be located, spreading them out around the country is more of an economic plan than a “this department works best here” plan. I also take the point that being closer to a community or group does not necessarily mean that you have a better understanding of it, but people tend to best understand that which they live with, and I doubt I will ever be convinced that it is healthy for the vast majority of senior public servants to live in Canberra with an understanding of Canberra issues. Having some here in Canberra and some in areas which are more likely to experience the occasional flood, and some in areas where livestock regularly meander across highways etc, in my view at least, creates a level of understanding which filters through to the implementation of policy.

As for public servants moving between departments, while it is good to have experienced staff use their experience in new ways, I also think there is such a thing as making it too easy to move between departments. Experience within a department is a valuable thing, and I would hope that any public servant would be able to take pride in their work and their department, and if given the opportunity would be willing to use that experience to become more senior within that department. I would hope that years of experience within a single department would increase the quality of work and the quality of training for new staff in that department. Being able to use that experience in another department is fine, but it should be based more on departmental need and less on moving around for the sake of moving around. Distributing departments would hopefully concentrate inter-departmental staff movements to an extent where moves have more to do with need and less to do with either moving because it’s possible or moving because a government thought it would be fun to rearrange the department acronyms again…not that governments shouldn’t rearrange the public service from time-to-time, but perhaps they would think more carefully before doing so if it was going to cost a heap to relocate a whole heap of staff.

The same strategy was tried in the 1970’s in the Albury-Wodonga region.

That plan was actually implemented, but fizzled out long ago.

SGS’s post puts me in mind of Ronald Reagan’s nine most terrifying words in the English language:

“I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.”

Samuel Gordon-Stewart said :

Once upon a time it made sense to have a bureaucracy which was centralised to the place where parliament was located. These days, in the age of electronic communications, there really is no need to have so much of the public service located in one place.

Yes, moving large parts of the public service out of Canberra may have detrimental short-term effects on Canberra’s economy, but the public service does not exist to keep Canberra economy ticking over, rather it exists to serve the interest of all Australians and, as such, should be willing to serve Australia’s interests in whatever location is of most benefit. That said, given that the federal government is largely responsible for Canberra’s economy having such reliance on the public service, the federal government should give due consideration to Canberra when planning changes which would impact on Canberra’s economy. Canberra’s interests should not be the only consideration, but they should at least be considered.

I do firmly believe that the nation’s interests are best served by a distributed public service. We have large populations in coastal areas which are, in some cases, overpopulated and under-served by infrastructure, while we also have massive sections of the country which are either underpopulated or uninhabited, but could very easily cater to the needs of part of our population, and should probably be built-up now if we are to expand in to them as the population grows so as to avoid further stretching the resources of existing overpopulated areas.

It would be silly to expect the private sector to build these areas up on their own. Economic incentives will help to attract the private sector, but the whole process will be much faster and much smoother if some public servants move in to these areas as well, and increase the market demand in the areas in the process. I would see no problem with granting public servants in these areas the same economic incentives (tax cuts etc) as private sector people/businesses who set up in these areas.

Some parts of the public service probably should keep a presence in Canberra, but hypothetically speaking (and without figuring out which acronym the various departments use as names this week) it does seem silly to base Immigration and Customs so far from a coastline; Indigenous Affairs so far away from the majority of their clients; Air Services Australia and CASA so far away from major airports (with apologies to Stephen Byron whose airport serves a purpose but is not as big as our major coastal airports) etc.

Apart from the idea of basing some departments in locations which are closer to the people with which they work the most, it seems logical to me to not have a centralised public service simply for cultural reasons. It happens in every industry that if the majority of your time is spent dealing with people in your industry, your mindset becomes based around your industry. A centralised public service lends itself to this in that, by having so many public servants and departments in one place, it is easy to think more about government than about the people whom the government is supposed to serve. Having a less centralised public service would, in my view, make it easier for the public service to work in a more efficient manner for the benefit of the general population.

It also strikes me as ironic that by decentralising the public service, the NBN would be an even less necessary proposition than it already is, as the extra population in regional areas combined with departmental data needs would result in a demand for high-speed internet services in regional areas which would be very attractive to the private sector.

Admittedly the whole idea would inconvenience some public servants, and the costs of moving people may be difficult in the short-term given the government’s current financial state, but the long-term benefits would far outweigh the short-term costs, and surely the long-term benefit of the nation is what our public servants should embrace.

Disclosure: I’m a Liberal Party member, but I have no hand in the discussion paper which was reported on by the media, nor am I talking as anything other than a private citizen with an opinion.

While not wanting to ‘play the man rather than the ball’ – I’m not sure you know fully know how the APS and government works in practice.

Once upon a time, government was centralized in Canberra for a reason. It wasn’t solely because the young nation at the time thought it was logistically better. It was also because we’re a Federation, and having Canberra as a neutral point would help ensure that the public service wouldn’t give undue development and favour to one state over another. Let me put this silly proposal in context:

Why should Northern Australia gain more development over Tasmania? Or South Australia? Or southern Western Australia? Or south east Queensland?

Why should Tasmanian taxes subsidise the development of Northern Australia?

But “the resources” you say – well how about the fact that most of this nation’s wealth is produced in the south east coast. Yep – the vast bulk of income, company and GST is derived from big bad Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

This is a general principle as to why the Australian Constitution was drafted to ensure that states are treated equally.

The public service – if it is to serve the interest of all Australians – should be free from the parochial bias that can exist in regional environments. I’ve worked in both State and Federal public services and the decision making culture is starkly different. States would see another state’s grandmother if it meant more for themselves. While they do develop like national interests in the spirit of reform – these are generally reforms bought by the Commonwealth.

I struggle with this point about it being a ‘Canberra’ issue. Why is economic activity in Canberra worse than economic activity in Cairns? Why should the country spend considerable funds moving this economic activity from one location to another? There is no net benefit to the consumer. New infrastructure would need to be built – but at what cost to the existing infrastructure that we are already paying for?

I also struggle with the notion that departments should be close to their clients, etc. It misunderstands in many ways what services the APS provides. In some areas of provision of customer services – they already are (Medicare, Centrelink, ATSI services are frequently outsourced or delivered through States). Others don’t have the population as customers – policy departments are better suited to being near each other so to ensure a lack of silos and ensure good consultation. By extracting your principle – the AFP should be located in the biggest crime spots to understand organized crime, the department of ageing should be on the Gold Coast and Treasury should be in Martin Place in Sydney. It’s like saying the best people to do corrective services policy are criminals, the best health policy experts are doctors – it isn’t. Often in my experience they make the worst. Placing Departments closer to their clients and expertise isn’t going to provide better advice or services.

Disclosure: I’m not a member of a political party. I am a public servant and I’ve been working to stop stupid ideas for over a decade.

While notable that 60% of the APS is already located outside of the ACT, it would be worth working out how much of the APS is actually outside of the countries capital cities. I have no figures to go on, but would suspect it is far lower.

Moving departments other than service delivery areas outside of the capital cities would fly against the whole idea of “A single APS”, because lets face it, except for a few “experts” in certain areas, large parts of APS skills/capabilities are easily transferable and the transfer of staff bewteen agencies is something that has been encouraged to avoid staleness and people getting too cushy in their own little areas.

If we start moving non-service areas to remote/rural localities i think you are likely to find that the transfer rates in these areas are going to plummet. The localities will become areas that only certain people go. You’ll get your initial uptake and then only those with a vested interest in the department in question will ever head out there. Or those looking to make a buck. You will see more of a return to people spending their entire careers in a single area/department, rather than shifting between them, gathering knowledge and experience from different areas and hopefully, benefitting the APS as a whole.

Now of course, we still have plenty of cases of this anyway and the APS is definitely no model of efficiency, but I hardly think a move that will encourage a return to the old ways is a positive.

Well, at least 60% of the APS is based outside Canberra anyway

When people talk about ‘distributing’ the APS it really means the APS management/policy areas. I still struggle to understand, for example, how an APS EL2 living in regional areas will have a greater understanding of issues – they will still be hanging out with their EL2 mates, working in an APS office etc etc. I dont pretend to understand the concerns of single mothers just because I live near the Northbourne Ave flats.

If the issue is to spend more money / increase employment in regional areas, then sure.

There is merit in the idea of making it attractive to move to certain locations, but surely part of such a plan would involve the NBN as an enabler for this to happen. Yet the coalition opposes this and has decided a second rate plan which means spending less money now and hiding the fact it will cost more in the long term….

johnboy said :

Still a hell of a lot easier (and vastly more effective) to pop around to another section’s desk to have a quick informal chat than to rely on email SGS

Phones with webcams are a decent substitute for in-person chats, but if department moves were to be handled in a logical manner where people who need to work with each other are moved together, the majority of the in-person chats could still happen.

gungsuperstar said :

Matt_Watts said :

Speaking privately, I see nothing wrong with it as a public servant.

Remind me… it used to be that roughly two-thirds of the Commonwealth public servants weren’t actually in Canberra – is that still the case?

If one is to develop the north (or change focus to any region) for a sustainable period, public servants would obviously need to move to support the increased population (the shopfronts for the Department of Human Services, etc). Yet I can’t see how that would necessarily result in a shift of Canberra-based policy wonks.

Disclaimer: yes, former Lib candidate, but speaking as a private individual.

And this is why Canberrans don’t vote Liberal – you don’t care about Canberra. You don’t care about the jobs, about the sustainability of small business that relies on the public service, on infrastructure, or about replacing those jobs so that today’s kids will have a job to go to when they grow up.

How would having some service delivery outside Canberra be detrimental to Canberra when it’s already outside Canberra? Did you even read my comment?

Samuel Gordon-Stewart said :

Once upon a time it made sense to have a bureaucracy which was centralised to the place where parliament was located. These days, in the age of electronic communications, there really is no need to have so much of the public service located in one place.

Still a hell of a lot easier (and vastly more effective) to pop around to another section’s desk to have a quick informal chat than to rely on email SGS

Once upon a time it made sense to have a bureaucracy which was centralised to the place where parliament was located. These days, in the age of electronic communications, there really is no need to have so much of the public service located in one place.

Yes, moving large parts of the public service out of Canberra may have detrimental short-term effects on Canberra’s economy, but the public service does not exist to keep Canberra economy ticking over, rather it exists to serve the interest of all Australians and, as such, should be willing to serve Australia’s interests in whatever location is of most benefit. That said, given that the federal government is largely responsible for Canberra’s economy having such reliance on the public service, the federal government should give due consideration to Canberra when planning changes which would impact on Canberra’s economy. Canberra’s interests should not be the only consideration, but they should at least be considered.

I do firmly believe that the nation’s interests are best served by a distributed public service. We have large populations in coastal areas which are, in some cases, overpopulated and under-served by infrastructure, while we also have massive sections of the country which are either underpopulated or uninhabited, but could very easily cater to the needs of part of our population, and should probably be built-up now if we are to expand in to them as the population grows so as to avoid further stretching the resources of existing overpopulated areas.

It would be silly to expect the private sector to build these areas up on their own. Economic incentives will help to attract the private sector, but the whole process will be much faster and much smoother if some public servants move in to these areas as well, and increase the market demand in the areas in the process. I would see no problem with granting public servants in these areas the same economic incentives (tax cuts etc) as private sector people/businesses who set up in these areas.

Some parts of the public service probably should keep a presence in Canberra, but hypothetically speaking (and without figuring out which acronym the various departments use as names this week) it does seem silly to base Immigration and Customs so far from a coastline; Indigenous Affairs so far away from the majority of their clients; Air Services Australia and CASA so far away from major airports (with apologies to Stephen Byron whose airport serves a purpose but is not as big as our major coastal airports) etc.

Apart from the idea of basing some departments in locations which are closer to the people with which they work the most, it seems logical to me to not have a centralised public service simply for cultural reasons. It happens in every industry that if the majority of your time is spent dealing with people in your industry, your mindset becomes based around your industry. A centralised public service lends itself to this in that, by having so many public servants and departments in one place, it is easy to think more about government than about the people whom the government is supposed to serve. Having a less centralised public service would, in my view, make it easier for the public service to work in a more efficient manner for the benefit of the general population.

It also strikes me as ironic that by decentralising the public service, the NBN would be an even less necessary proposition than it already is, as the extra population in regional areas combined with departmental data needs would result in a demand for high-speed internet services in regional areas which would be very attractive to the private sector.

Admittedly the whole idea would inconvenience some public servants, and the costs of moving people may be difficult in the short-term given the government’s current financial state, but the long-term benefits would far outweigh the short-term costs, and surely the long-term benefit of the nation is what our public servants should embrace.

Disclosure: I’m a Liberal Party member, but I have no hand in the discussion paper which was reported on by the media, nor am I talking as anything other than a private citizen with an opinion.

I’m wondering if they’ve costed the district/locality/remote location allowances for these people. The total cost of employment for people in those areas is pretty damn high.

Surely posting to Wadeye would be preferential to parking in Woden or Civic.

OK, Tony. Move your Libs HQ to Karratha to get the ball moving.

HiddenDragon said :

The document on the News site is stamped “Draft” and is described as “A 2030 Vision” – there is every chance that the person who will be PM in 2030 is not yet in the Parliament. In the meantime, while there may, to use the language of the draft, be scope to relocate some “relevant” components of departments and agencies, the relocation of “substantial” components would surely be ruled out on financial and other practical grounds – particularly in the very fiscally constrained years which lie ahead.

We could all be working from home by then – http://www.nbn.gov.au/nbn-benefits/telework/

The document on the News site is stamped “Draft” and is described as “A 2030 Vision” – there is every chance that the person who will be PM in 2030 is not yet in the Parliament. In the meantime, while there may, to use the language of the draft, be scope to relocate some “relevant” components of departments and agencies, the relocation of “substantial” components would surely be ruled out on financial and other practical grounds – particularly in the very fiscally constrained years which lie ahead.

I am a public servant and I work for a department (FaHCSIA) that works in the indigenous space (that’s what the I stands for people).

I wouldn’t be happy to be moved to Karratha -but any department should be near the people it’s serves surely.

milkman said :

What a beat up. I have an inside source here, and will just say that this is a fairly ‘out there’ discussion paper, much like many other ‘out there’ discussion papers that get passed around and later filed away under ‘i’ for ‘ignore’.

Either way, someone spent (wasted?) time putting it together….

The question is: why won’t any party back a plan that the people are actually keen to support? I mean as an example, a lot of people seem to like the idea of a fast East coast train system (eventually from Bris to Melb), yet the pollies – both sides – continually ignore things like this. Instead they come up with bizarre plans!

Personally, I like the canals idea better! 🙂

Baggy said :

johnboy said :

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

So we should only judge Liberal policies which are sane and ignore the insane ones?

Who said anything about policy? My reading of the document is it is a discussion paper – that is vastly different from a policy.

Maybe you should explain that to the fool who lost the ACT election, what’s his name. Umm yah Zed. His whole negativity campaign was based on a paper, none of which were ACT Labor policy.

Also you might want to explain that to Abbott and his mate pain in the arse and their not so fatty Jockey mate.

johnboy said :

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

So we should only judge Liberal policies which are sane and ignore the insane ones?

What a beat up. I have an inside source here, and will just say that this is a fairly ‘out there’ discussion paper, much like many other ‘out there’ discussion papers that get passed around and later filed away under ‘i’ for ‘ignore’.

Matt_Watts said :

Speaking privately, I see nothing wrong with it as a public servant.

Remind me… it used to be that roughly two-thirds of the Commonwealth public servants weren’t actually in Canberra – is that still the case?

If one is to develop the north (or change focus to any region) for a sustainable period, public servants would obviously need to move to support the increased population (the shopfronts for the Department of Human Services, etc). Yet I can’t see how that would necessarily result in a shift of Canberra-based policy wonks.

Disclaimer: yes, former Lib candidate, but speaking as a private individual.

And this is why Canberrans don’t vote Liberal – you don’t care about Canberra. You don’t care about the jobs, about the sustainability of small business that relies on the public service, on infrastructure, or about replacing those jobs so that today’s kids will have a job to go to when they grow up.

Isn’t it a pity Canberra’s economy was structured to be so reliant on the public service? Perhaps if it wasn’t, we wouldn’t need to worry about Canberra becoming a ghost town without it. They may as well move Parliament while they’re at it. I guess the the rest of us can take up benefits and move to the coast.

poetix said :

Yes, we’ll all be floated up on boats, using the epic system of canals that they are also planning.

Go Team Blue – make the water run uphill. Legend!

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

Actually Tony Abbott was on the news saying it’s a plan and not a policy.

Either way, madness! More of this for the lols please

poetix said :

Yes, we’ll all be floated up on boats, using the epic system of canals that they are also planning.

VFB’s running parallel to the train lines ?
Actually Poetix, you are smarter than most because the idea of canals has merit. Plenty of water up there to fill them.

johnboy said :

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

So we should only judge Liberal policies which are sane and ignore the insane ones?

It’s a discussion paper, so people are discussing it.

And many are balancing the pros with cons. Nothing wrong with that. Especially when such a major social engineering proposal is being considered by a party that claims to champion small government and echos the calls of a particular mining magnate who is pushing very hard for a special economic zone to be established around her own interests. Call me cynical, but that proposal needs to be examined by a number of female asian doctors with very big hands.

If this came from Labor the hard Right would be squealing it’s Red October all over again.

Yes, we’ll all be floated up on boats, using the epic system of canals that they are also planning.

johnboy said :

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

So we should only judge Liberal policies which are sane and ignore the insane ones?

Who said anything about policy? My reading of the document is it is a discussion paper – that is vastly different from a policy.

Speaking privately, I see nothing wrong with it as a public servant.

Remind me… it used to be that roughly two-thirds of the Commonwealth public servants weren’t actually in Canberra – is that still the case?

If one is to develop the north (or change focus to any region) for a sustainable period, public servants would obviously need to move to support the increased population (the shopfronts for the Department of Human Services, etc). Yet I can’t see how that would necessarily result in a shift of Canberra-based policy wonks.

Disclaimer: yes, former Lib candidate, but speaking as a private individual.

bd84 said :

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

So we should only judge Liberal policies which are sane and ignore the insane ones?

From all accounts, it’s nowhere close to being a “plan”. But I’m sure the media will beat it up and labor will jump up and down in a poor attempt to clutch to power.

The cost involved in such a transition; infrastructure demands, housing, upgrades to services to accommodate the new migrants .. never going to happen.

The plan is here: http://resources.news.com.au/files/2013/02/06/1226572/178934-tony-abbott-troppo-plan.pdf

Doesn’t say that public servants will be moved. Pity though.

Is Kate Lundy the same person that blackmailed ACT voters into voting Labor with health funding that was only available to the ACT if we re-elected Katy?

Don’t they have heaps of tornados and floods up there?
For all its many, many failings, at least Canberra is pretty stable when it comes to things like that.
How will this affect risk concentration in the insurance industry? Becomes really hard to diversify assets when so many policies are written over houses and cars that are sitting in flood plains/cyclone country.

The idea may have merit for departments relating to say indigenous affairs perhaps, but as it is centrelink and defence are already heavily in these regions. ATO has some biggish offices outside of Canberra also. but lets face it, there is only so much moving could do, especially when the coalition doesn’t think the NBN is a great idea….

Straight from the NSW play book. How to get rid of public servants without having to pay redundancies, have their positions transferred to the least appealing locations possible. Nice.