Centre for Policy Development's Blog, page 110

ROUNDTABLES | The World's Best Public Service: How are we Tracking?

Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey recently pledged to slash 12,000 public servants 'for starters'. What prompted this pledge? What does it signify? What problem would retrenching thousands of public servants solve? What problems might it create?

CPD's Public Service Program seeks to encourage an informed debate about the Australian Public Service.

In July, we released reports on attitudes toward the public service and the staffing of Australian Public Service agencies. And we've just launched our State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report which includes additional sections on:

The role of the public service
Staffing and funding – growth and contraction
Outsourcing and privatisation
Integrating the public, private and community sectors

Ahead of the release of State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report we've made available the following chapters:

Staffing the Public Service Report: How many public servants is enough?

Attitudes to the Public Service

In coming weeks, CPD will host roundtable discussions to present our new report in Sydney (Tuesday 23 August), Melbourne (Tuesday 30 August) and Canberra (Tuesday 6 September). The discussions will commence at 11.30am with a presentation of the report's main findings, followed by informal discussion and a light lunch.

Numbers are limited and RSVP is essential. For further details about these roundtables or to RSVP, contact Marian Spencer at Marian.Spencer(at)cpd.org.au (and do tell us a little about your interest in the public service and why I'd like to come along).

CPD's Public Service Program encourages progressive Australians to contribute constructively to debates about the public service. When conservative voices call for a contraction of the public service, advocate outsourcing and privatisation, or call for dramatic cuts to staff and programs, few think tanks, research organisations or civil society groups respond. The result is a one-sided argument that over-looks the value of adequately funded agencies that provide necessary community services and address needs that the private and community sectors are unwilling or unable to. This debate is rarely evidence-based and overwhelmingly negative.

For further details about CPD's Public Service program, contact James Whelan at James.Whelan(at)cpd.org.au

At CPD we want to make good ideas matter. Like what you've read?

DONATE and support deeper thinking. Become an Ideas Sustainer now.

The Big Society | John Seddon's insights into UK public sector reform

Through the Blair years John Seddon gained a reputation as a leading critic of public-sector reform in the United Kingdom. John has received numerous academic awards for his contribution to management thinking. He has developed methods to help managers of service organisations change from a conventional command-and-control design to a systems design. CPD and IPAA will host a seminar with John Seddon in Sydney on Wednesday August 31st.

David Cameron, our prime minister, described the Big Society as a 'culture change', where people are free and powerful enough to help themselves and their communities. He said government must foster and support a new culture of philanthropy and social action.

The good news: we have a growing body of evidence where services have been improved, setting economic benchmarks, at the same time as improving community life. The first example of the Vanguard Method in action in health care is delivering better stroke care at half the cost. Patients and families are much happier and have confidence in the health service. In many examples of benefits processing in local authorities, benefits are sorted in days and the whole of peoples' circumstances are taken into account; claimants are delighted and take a more constructive attitude to their own circumstances and their local authority. In policing, dropping the centrally-promulgated labels for 'crime' and 'incidents' in favour of understanding how communities define their problems leads to resolution of problems, improving both community cohesion and the community's relationship with their police. In social care, joint studying and re-design between local authority and health services is delivering improved social care at massively less cost; helping people who need support to live with dignity within their communities. And in housing we have seen the private and public sectors working together to deliver repairs on the day and at the time tenants want. In fact this was our first lesson in the impact of good service design on community cohesion: people take greater responsibility for their own 'space' when services work.

All of the above examples employ the systems principles we have developed for service design. They understand the nominal value of the service user, they absorb the variety of this demand, they have better means of control, using measures that relate to the purpose of the services from the users' point of view, they are designs that have emerged from studying rather than being 'planned' or 'specified' in any sense and they demonstrate that better service can be provided at much lower costs, they drive out costs by managing value. They exploit, in a positive way, the systemic relationship between purpose, measures and method.

We see other important innovations occurring in communities: 'Local area coordinators' provide continuity in relationships with people who need support, accessing that support from statutory, voluntary and community resources. Token economies: where people gain credits for their efforts in helping others and exchange the tokens they earn for help that they need. And we see investment of peoples' time being matched by cash from local government to pursue local initiatives to solve real problems.

All of the above could be construed as within the rubric of the Big Society. Yet they are not; paradoxically many of these innovations are at risk from the Big Society.

The Local Government Chronicle recently ran a feature on the Big Society, to mark its first anniversary. What did we learn? Of the four 'vanguard' local authorities, one had withdrawn from their 'vanguard' status for political reasons and the other three had simply re-labelled initiatives they had already started a year ago as 'Big Society' initiatives. When we ask people we are working with in local authorities about their take on the Big Society, most give us blank looks.

What is government doing? Two things: the first is pulling a lever marked 'scale'. Government is driving 'commissioning', the delivery of services against specifications with a preference for large-scale organisations as suppliers. For example in drug treatment, social, and health care we see contracts being awarded to providers who are obliged to deliver services as specified. The result is a failure to meet the nominal value of service users. For example, people who need help with bathing get their thirty minutes, no less, no more; and it may mean a different person on each visit. What ought to be a thermostat in the care system is removed; there is no incentive to re-enable people. Similarly with drug treatment, we see treatment professionals being obliged to follow the 'treatment' as specified in their contracts, spending as much as 50% of their time in bureaucratic reporting of compliance while the 'treatments' fail to meet the variety of drug users' needs. With meals-on-wheels contracts we have seen specific instructions not to report on a change in the condition of the meal recipient ('just do what the contract says').

Ministers believe that scale will reduce costs. By contracting for 'transactions' they may well see a reduction in the transaction costs but as these standardised services fail to meet the users' needs, costs can only rise. Some of these costs will be knowable, the greater unknowable.

Ministers also believe that 'choice' will drive up quality and drive down costs. I should point out that there is no evidence in the economics literature to support this view; it is no more than an ideological belief. Regardless, commissioning is reducing choice; it is driving many local voluntary services out of business as they do not have the clout to bid for contracts. At the same time, cuts to local authority budgets have been passed through as funding cuts to thousands of local voluntary providers. We have seen local area coordinators sacked, shocking when you know that these people are the means for dealing with the variety problem in the context of community services: local area coordinators worked because they 'pulled' services to needs; but they are replaced by commissioning, which 'pushes' specifications without regard to needs.

Local authority people are being schooled by central government on how to do commissioning; how to specify the services required and establish measures to control the providers on the bases of unit cost and activity. Meeting specifications is about as far as you can get from meeting purpose and, ironically, meeting purpose would drive costs down, as the examples I began with illustrate.

The second thing government is doing is employing an organisation to send hundreds of 'activists' in to communities, whose job it is to encourage the Big Society to happen. Sending out activists to create the Big Society may create some activity, especially where people have problems they want to solve, but it is not an effective method for creating change, not least because it implicitly discounts those who are currently doing great work. Recognising these people is the better place to start.

Fritz Schumacher, claimed by some to Cameron's inspiration for the Big Society, said you have to start at the human level if you want to change society. The first task, he argued, is to recognise people who are already doing something about it, to support them and ask: what do we need to do as government to ensure that more of this good work happens elsewhere? He, like other economists, warned that the de-humanisation of work will lead to the failure of society; in the context of the Big Society, making work instrumental (adhere to contract) is to go against the grain; instead work should be purposive and vocational – just as it already is for many who now feel disenfranchised by the Big Society.

To give him credit, Cameron also said that top-down, top-heavy, controlling micro-management from the centre doesn't work and only serves to sap energy and diminish contribution. But illustrating the centre's belief in 'levers', he and his ministers pull the lever marked 'Big', replacing micro-management with macro structure.

Cameron said you can call it liberalism, you can call it empowerment, you can call it freedom, you can call it responsibility, but, he said, 'I call it the Big Society'. If we had to choose a better operational definition for the Big Society maybe it should be called Big Business or, perhaps, the Big Folly. Suggestions welcome.

But I do not despair. The costs of the scale initiatives will emerge, in time, and embarrass the politicians, the problems we have in our communities will not go away and in the meantime, those who are delivering services that work which are also having profoundly beneficial effects on their communities will continue, even if under the radar. Some, of course, will lose their jobs but they will never lose what they now know.

To give a final example: people responsible for housing allocations learn, when they study the service, that most of the people on the housing waiting list will never qualify for a house, so they let these people know where they stand and take them off the list. They also learn that there are many people on the list who have a problem which would not be solved by providing housing and they work to help these people take responsibility and solve their problems in their communities. And, when they get down to the few who actually need a home, this shorter list can be accommodated. These new, citizen-focused, problem-solving designs, delivered by people that Cameron would describe as 'empowered' (noxious term), which build strength into communities, also operate at much less cost.

As Schumacher observed, small really is beautiful.

John Seddon

john@vanguardconsult.co.uk

Author: "Systems Thinking in the Public Sector", available from Triarchy Press: http://www.triarchypress.com and "Freedom from command and control: a better way to make the work work" available from Vanguard (http://www.systemsthinking.co.uk).

 

Cheryl McGregor | Paying our respects to the bureaucrats

Cheryl McGregor at The Newcastle Herald, has mined the sneak preview of our upcoming paper, The State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report to find that as citizens we are discerning enough to distinguish our feelings for the government of the day from what we think of our public service and the people who work in it.

Contrary to depictions in the media and what our pollies might have to say, we actually respect those of our fellow citizens who spend their working lives on the national payroll. So new research as part of our Public Service program reveals the rhetoric does not match up to public opinion.

Cheryl McGregor writes:

New research shows that ordinary Australians prefer to have the public sector provide essential community services, and are even willing to pay higher taxes rather than have them privatised or outsourced.

Yet politicians in successive state and federal governments have deliberately moved away from regulating markets for social outcomes. Instead they've concentrated on job cuts, freezes and "removing deadwood" in the public service, while insisting that handing services over to commercial providers results in greater efficiency. Centre for Policy Development researcher James Whelan uncovered the deep divide between the public and the pollies by looking in detail at 10 major polls, some taken at regular intervals over 20years; studying 500 newspaper articles from 2010-2011; and searching parliamentary reports from 2007 on.

But the surveys consistently showed voters on both left and right rejecting even the current Holy Grail of both major parties – a budget surplus – in favour of maintaining public services.

The difficulty, however, is to convince the politicians of this as a basis for long-term policies.

It's a matter of concern, he argues, because important policy decisions are made on the basis of public service advice. If the politicians actively dislike the public service, their decisions will not be in line with community wishes.

Read Cheryl McGregor's evaluation of our current excerpt from our upcoming paper, The State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report here.

And find our chapter, Attitudes Toward the Public Service here. The full report, The State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report, is due for release in mid-August. Be sure you are signed up to hear about it and read it when it comes out.

[image error] At CPD we want to make good ideas matter. Like what you've read?

DONATE and support deeper thinking. Become an Ideas Sustainer now.

 

 

The Long Carbon Journey Q&A and panel discussion

Green Capital presents  Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer Wayne Swan making keynote address and Q&A on climate change policy in Australia. CPD's Laura Eadie sat on the expert panel discussing  "What's next for a sustainable future?"

How will business start to change if it costs more to pollute and there are market rewards for being clean? Who'll deliver the investment, innovation and infrastructure to enable the transformation to a low-pollution, sustainable economy?  Can the political system sustain the effort over the decades?

[...] will be voicing  a strong message on the action needed from Australia's policy makers, politicians, community visionaries  and business groups to craft a sustainable future.

The date for your diary:  Thursday 4 August 2011

Venue: The Arts Centre: Spire Building, ANZ Pavilion, Level 8, 100 St Kilda Road, Melbourne

Click here to find out more.

The Long Carbon Jouney Q&A and panel discussion

Green Capital presents  Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer Wayne Swan making keynote address and Q&A on climate change policy in Australia. CPD's Laura Eadie sat on the expert panel discussing  "What's next for a sustainable future?"

How will business start to change if it costs more to pollute and there are market rewards for being clean? Who'll deliver the investment, innovation and infrastructure to enable the transformation to a low-pollution, sustainable economy?  Can the political system sustain the effort over the decades?

[...] will be voicing  a strong message on the action needed from Australia's policy makers, politicians, community visionaries  and business groups to craft a sustainable future.

The date for your diary:  Thursday 4 August 2011

Venue: The Arts Centre: Spire Building, ANZ Pavilion, Level 8, 100 St Kilda Road, Melbourne

Click here to find out more

Ben Eltham | The Global Craze for Austerity Will Result in More Pain

Fear is again stalking international markets. Ben Eltham thinks we should not be surprised. In Europe, the sovereign debt crisis that has wracked Greece and Portugal has now spread to the larger economies of Italy and Spain. In the US, economic growth has come to a standstill and the proportion of US adults who are employed is now at 58.2 per cent, the worst in 28 years.

While there are differences in the situations in Europe and the US, some of the world's largest economies are not looking so mighty. Europe and the US seem to be plunging into recession. Ben Eltham asks how did we get here? Well, he takes us back to the economic crisis of 2008 – and the stimulus response.

Ben Eltham writes:

"But now the stimulus has run out, and the economic malaise is still with us. After all, unlike the banks, many ordinary householders didn't get bailed out: they lost their jobs, and then their houses. As a result, many rich countries have been left with huge budget deficits and weak economic growth. The response by the UK and now the US has been to ignore unemployment and focus on debt. The result will be more economic pain."

Instead we have 'austerity' measures.

But none of this will affect Australia, right? Wrong.

"But underlying the weakness of the domestic economy is a third factor, which has received surprisingly little discussion: falling Commonwealth spending. You might not realise it if you listened to Tony Abbott or Joe Hockey, but this year's budget papers tell us that federal government spending will be strongly contractionary. According to budget paper one, the Commonwealth is in the process of subtracting $52 billion of spending from the economy over the two years from 2010-11. As the budget papers state, "this would be the fastest return to surplus in the 44 years … for which data is available".

But such is the economic orthodoxy in Australian politics, no-one is suggesting that the Government delay getting back into surplus by a year or two in light of weaker economic growth. Spooked by the effectiveness of the Coalition's anti-debt and anti-spending sound bites, Wayne Swan and the Gillard Government are desperate to prove they can return a surplus – even at the expense of economic growth.

That's the problem with empty slogans like "end the waste" and "pay back the debt": if you actually take them seriously, they can end up costing jobs and hurting lives. At least the Reserve Bank has the room to move interest rates down. It looks like it is going to have to."

How will our government respond if the global economy plunges into recession?

READ Ben Eltham's article in ABC's The Drum Unleashed here.

 

Ben Eltham | The Costly Disease in Our Backing Orchestras

You can't have an opera or a ballet without a live orchestra. (Well, you can, but it wouldn't be quite the same, would it?) And you can't have an orchestra without very large buckets of money.

But the current model is "economically unsustainable", according to a new report from the Australia Council. Our "pit" orchestras are broke, or close enough to it.

The report's author Justin Macdonnell bluntly states: "No one having regard to the complexities of this area could avoid the conclusion that it is hedged about with historically derived practice, sectional interests, arcane regulation and, in some cases, sheer inertia."

"In the end," Ben Eltham writes today, "something will have to give." The reverberations around traditional performing arts in this country will be significant.

Has there ever been a report into Australia's orchestras that has met with their approval? Apparently not.

In 2005, the Australia Council's current chairman, highly connected company director James Strong, delivered a report into Australia's professional orchestra companies. It wasn't pretty. Some of Australia's orchestras were struggling with static or falling audiences, and rising wage costs. Strong recommended more federal […]

Read the rest of Ben's article published in Crikey here (subscription required).

Chris Bonnor | Deciphering education funding

School funding is one of those topics that gets people fired up, and recent stories about elite schools like Sydney's Cranbrook making $7.3 million in profit last year while copping a massive $5.3 million in public funding only fuel the debate. The My School site has also divided opinion – some see it as unfair – trashing the reputations of public schools in socially disadvantaged areas that never really had a chance. Private schools won't be providing details of their assets, trust accounts and profits on the New My School 3.0 website due out next year despite Peter Garrett wanting it. The body that administers the site says it's not possible to include the extra information before the site's revamp.

While all this is happening the Gonski Review is going to try and have another look at how we could reform the education system. Radio Adelaide's Tim Brunero spoke to CPD resident education expert, Chris Bonnor to make sense of all of this. Tim asked him what the Gonski Review was trying to achieve.

LISTEN to Chris Bonnor's interview here.

For more, visit Chris Bonnor's site Education Media Watch Website

[image error] At CPD we want to make good ideas matter. Like what you've read?

DONATE and support deeper thinking. Become an Ideas Sustainer now.

James Whelan | Public Opinion Pro Public Service

Public Servants: lazy bureaucratic fat cats or necessary to achieve "ambitious goals for a richer, fairer and greener Australia" (Kim Carr)?

Recent CPD research has returned some surprising results regarding attitudes towards the public service and staffing trends. While politicians regularly criticise the role our public servants are doing, social surveys highlight the fact that citizens support a well-funded public sector. The rhetoric that the public service is growing out of control and needs to be 'cut' is also shown to unfounded. Between 1990 and 1999, approximately one-third of the APS workforce was retrenched. Although APS staffing levels have almost returned to 1991 levels, the Australian population has also increased. There are now fewer public servants per capita than 20 years ago.

CPD's Public Service Research Director, James Whelan joined Tim Brunero from Radio Adelaide today to tell listeners what his study found.

LISTEN to the radio podcast here.

We recently released two excerpts from the upcoming paper:

Staffing the Public Service: How Many Public Servants is Enough? andAttitudes Toward the Public Service.

Download the excerpts here and here if you'd like to read more about staffing and CPD's ideas about the Public Service here.

CPD's upcoming paper State of the Australian Public Service: An Alternative Report will be available mid-August.

At CPD we want to make good ideas matter. Like what you've read?

DONATE and support deeper thinking. Become an Ideas Sustainer now.

 

Citizen-centric services conference | Canberra 26-27 September

Strengthening participation, change management & service delivery efficiencies.

A decade ago, Australia was a world leader in service delivery reform. Various agencies also contributed to the shaping of organisations around the globe.

The citizen-centric revolution, however, represents an overhaul of government service provision. The Australian public are no longer passive recipients of services, but instead are achieving long-term efficiencies from having input into service design and delivery.

The historic Intergovernmental Agreement on Federal Financial Relations' focuses on improving the quality and effectiveness of government services. This includes increasing government accountability to achieve better service delivery outcomes. The additional $7.1 billion being allocated to States to improve services is also being monitored, assessed and reported on an annual basis.

Overcoming Complexities With Citizen Centric Service Delivery reflects on what it means for governments to become citizen-centric and how to overcome common barriers. Via a series of case studies, presenters will illustrate models for citizen centricity, internal change management and partnership frameworks.

Heralding leaders in service delivery reform, community engagement and public sector innovation from international, Federal and state levels, this conference is a must for policy and service deliverers in this new era of public service.

Draw insights into:

How to provide easier access to and more efficient services
How to balance the interests of citizens and the broader economy
Case management and cross-agency service delivery
How to develop partnerships and long-term service delivery efficiencies

Program and registration click here