"One day a rooster, the next day a feather duster!"
By LAURIE PATTON | 24 February 2020
The buck has to stop somewhere. Despite the prime minister’s best efforts when it comes to the so-called ‘sport rorts’ affair it’s unlikely to stop with a temporarily sacked minister. Now the work of his highly politicised department head is firmly under scrutiny.
Continue reading “Sports rorts shows need for public sector re-think”
By LAURIE PATTON | 19 July 2018
We need to inject some ultimate responsibility into public administration. The buck has to stop somewhere.
What was perceived in some circles as two highly political appointments to plum roles in the federal public service highlights a need to re-examine government administration in the 21st Century. Not because such appointments are necessarily inappropriate, but because they expose a basic disconnect.
We still like to pretend we have an olde-worlde apolitical public service consisting of career bureaucrats who have no political leanings and/or are never influenced by them. If this was ever the case, it is no longer.
Worse still, the way public servants pursue their upward career mobility results in a surplus of generalists and a dearth of subject matter experts.
Continue reading “Public servants, political appointments and good government”