There are several ways of looking at the new service: that there is no real change; that it will be a flexible, responsive body meeting the needs of a small government; or that it will be a centralist, corporatist body dominated by the ideology of the present Labor Government.
The no-real-change view is supported by the fact that the ACT service and the conditions of its employees is broadly based on what happens in the Federal Government. That is true, insofar as the ACT service will be broadly similar to state public services.
Which of the other views is better depends on how the “”management standards” work. The “”management standards” are provided for in the Bill. They will enable the commissioner to lay down standards on 26 matters, including industrial relations, terms and conditions, training, audit, equal opportunity etc.
At present, about 20 ACT Acts enable various bodies to engage in public-sector employment and to lay down employment conditions. Examples are the Canberra Theatre, the Milk Authority, ACT Electricity and Water and the ACT TAB. After July 1, there will be one. One-in-all-in.
Once in, central employment conditions and principles will apply by law to all: the public-sector ethos statement, merit, equal opportunity, industrial democracy, access and equity, non-discrimination, leave (recreation, long-service, maternity and sick), whistle-blowing protection, disciplinary procedures, appeal procedures.
So at a time when all other state and federal bureaucracies are devolving, commercialising and privatising, the ACT will be unifying, applying uniform standards and centralising.
All of the commercial operations of the Government will come within the public-sector rules. And there can be no enterprise bargaining to chip them away. (Extra money for no appeals against promotions, for example, would not be allowed. Nor would trading leave for pay.) To fill vacancies, managers will have to go through the process of notification, interview rules and appeals.
Commercial standards like payment on commission and firing because the bottom line is not met will be difficult, if not impossible.
The “”management standards” are overlaid on these and cannot be inconsistent with them.
The ACT Government says the standards will have exclusions and inclusions for various parts of the service to give more flexibility.
The Government argues that it is reasonable to have uniform ethics and standards about the behaviour of employees and managers and the rights of employees and that flexibility and responsiveness can be dealt with in the management standards which will recognise the different needs and functions of the agencies.
Incidentally, there are four exceptions to the Public Sector Management Bill. Totalcare Industries (the commercialised laundry in
Mitchell); the ACT TAB is out for six months because of the Vitab inquiry; the firefighters because they are a uniformed service with different discipline requirements (though they may come in later); and the new International Hotel School which is negotiating arrangements with Cornell University.
Another element of the centralising argument is the head of the Chief Minister’s Department in effect has a veto over all SES appointments, except in the Legal Aid Office and ACTEW.
This arises because all SES appointments have to go to a committee which includes the head of Chief Minister’s (or delegate), the commission (or delegate) and the departmental head (or delegate).
The idea of the committee was to prevent a recurrence of the NSW Metherell case in the ACT, but the upshot puts a lot of bureaucratic power in the hands of the head of Chief Minister’s.
The Government’s argument is that it is appropriate in a smaller service to have some uniform general principles.
Opposition front-bencher Trevor Kaine, who chairs the Assembly committee on the service, says it has been a wasted opportunity.
His committee is looking at the legislation this week and next week. The other members are Labor’s Wayne Berry and Independent Helen Szuty.
Mr Kaine says the Government should have looked at what it wanted from its public service an structured it accordingly from scratch.
“”What’s happened is there’s been some renaming of people in the chairs, giving them a new logo and everything goes on as before,” he said. “”The entire emphasis has been on mechanics and the rights of public servants, not on the job they do.”
Kaine’s view is that not much changes. However, there is a strong streak of centralism in the new set-up. It may well be that that does not sit well in the commercial arms of government. They might lose efficiency, which will then have the result of giving the Opposition more ammunition for privatisation.