ONE OF the major goals of 1993 for the ACT Chief Minister, Rosemary Follett, was the establishment of a separate ACT Public Service. It did not happen.
At present nearly all the employees who serve the ACT polity are in effect Federal Public servants. Given the wide, almost sovereign powers of the ACT legislature, executive and judiciary, a separate ACT Public Service makes sense. Employees in it will have their first loyalties to the ACT and will not constantly be viewing their careers in a Federal context.
The ACT can never be fully sovereign and never be completely like the states because the Federal Parliament, Government and Australians in general have obvious permanent interests in the ACT which transcend the local legislature and the people who elected it. None the less, given the broad legislative powers invested in the Legislative Assembly, a separate service to administer and execute the laws it makes would complete the self-government process.
It should give an opportunity to make much-needed improvements in public administration in the ACT. The evidence to date shows some severe problems with the present hybrid set-up. Significantly, these short-comings were found by one officer who is answerable directly to the ACT Assembly _ the Auditor-General. The short-comings should be profoundly embarrassing. The audited reports of the ACT Treasury, Attorney-General’s Department, Chief Minister’s, Urban Services , Housing and Community Services and ACTION were qualified. In other words, the financial reports of the bulk of the ACT public sector were unsatisfactory. The auditor found many other short-comings in various parts of the service.
A separate service, of course, will not of itself cure the short-comings. However, it will give the sense of separate identity needed for the forces of peer pressure, shame, pride, responsibility and accountability to be more effective.
In creating a separate service, terms and conditions of employment and the structure of the service are key elements. Of equal importance is attracting good people to the top of the service.
The present head of the ACT Government Service, Bill Harris, is expected to leave the job in the middle of the month at the expiry of his contract. government sources have suggested that the Secretary of the Department of Environment, Land and Planning, Jeff Townsend, will act in the position, pending a permanent appointment which other government sources suggest he will get.
This has resulted in the Opposition and an Independent MLA to call for the position to be advertised widely and a selection made from the widest possible field.
Clearly, the position is of paramount importance. The Leader of the Opposition, Kate Carnell, made a pertinent point in saying it was important for the Chief Minister, Rosemary Follett, to headhunt “”for someone with real experience in public-sector restructuring”. Independent Michael Moore, said rightly that the Government should consider appointing someone with experience in state public-service reform.
There is nothing to suggest that the Government has decided to give Mr Townsend the job without advertising and considering all candidates on their merit. The important point is that the Government must make the most of the opportunity by providing attractive conditions (not just monetarily but in creating a challenging environment for reform and innovation) to ensure a wide range of candidates from throughout Australia apply.
It may well be that at the end of that process, an internal appointment is the most appropriate given the range of candidates, but the evidence of public-sector malaise in the ACT at present suggests that a new broom is required, or at least that there is less to lose and more to gain by making an outside appointment.