Louise Miller-Frost (Boothby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Today I rise in support of the Public Service Amendment Bill 2023, which will amend the previous act of 1999. The Albanese government is delivering accountability and integrity in our institutions by taking the next steps in rebuilding the Australian Public Service. This bill is all about restoring the public's trust and faith in government as well as the multitude of government services the APS provides. It is an important part of the Albanese government's broader APS reform agenda, which is reinvesting in and valuing what is the APS's most valuable resource—its people.

Many of the proposed amendments implement the independent recommendations of the Thodey review, which was largely sidelined under the previous government. In late 2019 the Thodey review found the APS was in desperate need of a service-wide transformation, enshrining both short-term change and long-term reform to achieve better outcomes for the Australian public. The independent review involved extensive public consultation, including engagement with more than 11,000 individuals and organisations working in the APS over more than 400 meetings, workshops and information sessions. With this bill, the Albanese government is putting the people who use our services front and centre because accessibility of government services should reflect the diverse group of people that use them.

The Public Service Amendment Bill 2023 will strengthen the APS's core purpose and values to create an APS with the capability and integrity to do its job well. It will build the capability of the APS and support good governance, accountability and transparency. The bills four key pillars reflect our government's vision for an APS that best serves Australians. We want a truly independent APS that is empowered to embody integrity in everything it does. We want an APS that puts people and business at the core of its daily operations. We want an APS that is a model employer for the over 150,000 strong workforce that serves as its backbone. And we want an APS that is supported by our government and future governments to have the capability to do its job to the highest standard. The Albanese Labor government is acting on this vision with the introduction of this bill, which I am proud to support.

First, I wish to reinforce how the bill lays the foundations for stronger integrity in the APS. To uphold integrity in the APS, the bill will ensure an independent public service which supports transparency and good governance. The bill will make it clear that ministers cannot direct agency heads on employment matters. It will require agency heads to implement measures which enable employees at the lowest appropriate classification to make appropriate decisions. This way, decision-making is not delegated to a higher level than is necessary, and this will reduce the unnecessary hierarchy in the APS and empower employees to act with integrity.

The bill makes it necessary for agencies' APS employee's census results to be published, creating a publicly accessible blueprint for action that responds to results. This greater transparency will foster a culture of honesty and accountability, supporting continuous employment within the agencies to meet their goals for the Australian people. Our APS must be empowered to be honest and truly independent and to remain true to due process. That is why this bill is being introduced, to ensure that, as the minister says, the APS is ready to deliver advice that the government of the day may not want to hear just as loudly as the advice that we do want to hear.

These structural changes to the APS are supplemented by an important cultural shift ushered in by the introduction of the bill. Predominantly, this involves the introduction of a new core value of stewardship that all employees must uphold. Stewardship means the APS is committed to supporting the public interest now and into the future by understanding the long-term implications of what it does. It is an ethical value, involving the responsible planning and management of services to respond to the needs of all Australians who rely on them. This reflects recommendation 5 of the Thodey review, which called for the core principles of the APS values to be strengthened, highlighting a need to reaffirm the important and enduring role that all of our valued APS employees play in serving successive governments, the parliament and the broader Australian public.

The Public Service builds on a wealth of knowledge and human capital created through years of experience, and it is important that the values of the APS are dictated only by those within it, not by the comparatively fleeting governments which it serves. That is why the bill will also require the Secretaries Board to oversee the development of a single, unifying APS purpose statement, encouraging the Public Service to think critically about its values. Once a unifying purpose is chosen, the statement will be mandatorily reviewed every five years to ensure it is meaningfully adopted. This implements recommendation 6 of the Thodey review: developing and embedding an inspiring purpose to unite the APS in serving the nation as a unified front. All agency heads will therefore be required to uphold and promote the new APS purpose statement in addition to the existing APS Values and Employment Principles. This will ensure the values of the APS more accurately represent the values of its employees and the role of the Public Service in modern Australia.

Again, the act will make it clear that ministers cannot direct agency heads on individual APS staffing decisions, including the implementation of this unifying purpose. This will affirm the APS's rightly apolitical nature, ensuring we give it the support needed to remain fiercely independent and free from government bias in its advice.

This bill puts people and business at the centre of the services delivered to them. Our government is working with the heads of the APS on a vision for partnership between the Public Service and the people it serves. This includes close engagement and co-design with communities, businesses, the not-for-profit sector, universities, states, territories and others. Crucially, this vision will include a Charter of Partnerships and Engagement which makes a promise about working to ensure the Public Service is a trusted partner which the community can rely upon to put their needs at the centre of policy implementation and delivery.

This links to how the bill will work for the people at the centre of the APS—its employees. The government is working to deliver a renewed APS which is an equitable, model employer, with ample opportunity for promotion and development. I reaffirm what the minister said: the greatest resource of the APS is its people. If we want the Public Service to focus on the needs of the Australian people, we have to focus on the people who will be delivering those needs. We need to co-design the way the APS runs in consultation with those that run it. What is their experience of working with the public? Are we attracting and retaining Australia's brightest? If the answer is no, then we need to find out what can be done to foster a better culture of inclusion and professional development.

As I previously mentioned, encouraging decision-making to occur at all levels of APS employment will help shape workplaces that empower staff and create opportunities for professional development. The reforms will help make this opportunity available to all Australians looking for work within the APS. As the minister mentioned in her second reading speech, while there have been many hard-fought gains in the APS, including that the proportion of women in senior APS executive roles is now 52 per cent, there is more work to be done. Transparency breeds accountability, and that's why the bill will require the APS to report to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, so it can be a leader in driving ambition on gender equality.

Employment of people with disabilities has reduced in the last 30 years, and the introduction of this bill is also aimed at setting the stage for greater workplace inclusivity and equal opportunity, to attract and retain a more diverse workforce.

Representation of First Nations people in the APS is currently 3.5 per cent. We know it can and should be better. That is why it is this government's policy to hold the APS to meet its ambitious target of increasing First Nations employment to five per cent, in line with its commitment to elevating First Nations voices to parliament.

We also promise to deliver on the government's commitment to reduce reliance on consultants, creating opportunities to work across departments for a unified vision of the APS. The bill supports the development of an in-house consulting model for the APS, to strengthen functions that have previously been contracted out, providing more opportunities for public servants to upskill, collaborate with colleagues and challenge themselves in new roles, to retain more of the workforce.

Finally, I want to point out how this bill seeks to build a robust APS, with the capability of doing its job well. The APS Academy is a hub of learning and development excellence which is already boosting service capability. Around 20,000 staff have been through its doors to date. The government is also introducing the APS Workforce Strategy 2025, as well as the APS Learning and Development Strategy, to review the capability of the APS over the next few years.

Accompanying this careful monitoring is our commitment to reinstituting independent capability reviews. This amendment acts on the concerns of the Thodey review that the capabilities of the APS have been eroded over time. It seeks to establish a future-fit APS, with a culture of continuous improvement, by making regular independent and transparent capability reviews a five-yearly requirement. With this requirement, the Albanese government is investing in the long-term capability of the APS. It is investing in a skilled, confident, competent workforce which will deliver modern policy and service solutions where they're needed most. Capability reviews and their associated action plans are a crucial opportunity for reflection and future oriented development. They've already been adopted in public sectors in many international jurisdictions, including the UK, New Zealand and Canada. Knowing where we are at and being able to anticipate future challenges keeps our Public Service agile and adaptive to the changing needs of Australians as we head towards 2025.

All sorts of Australians interact on a daily basis with their Public Service, whether it's a teenager seeking their first tax file number for their first job or a pensioner seeking a Medicare rebate. There is no reason why we should not ensure the running of these services is done independently, efficiently and clearly for all Australians, and that is what the heart of this bill goes to. With this bill we are creating lasting reforms to ensure the integrity, efficiency and excellence of the APS. We are creating reforms which finally address independent advice from the Thodey review, reforms that are long overdue, reforms that cannot be rolled back to meet the needs of future governments without being driven by the public, those who the APS is designed to serve.

I am so proud to be a part of a government which is creating opportunities for innovation in the APS through legislated review and strategic future focused action. I'm proud that our government is standing up to ensure the APS is a leading workplace that attracts and retains some of Australia's finest and brightest. And I am proud that we are looking, with this bill, to make the APS a more inclusive and equitable place to work as well as a smoother service to interact with for Australians.

A large number of the constituent inquiries we get through my electorate office in Boothby relate to various functions of the Public Service, because that's, after all, where my electorate members should be going when they have challenges. A number of those inquiries relate to wait times and labour hire contracts where people are turned over—'There's a loss of the memory of what I said last time when I phoned up.' People are frustrated. I think these reforms are something that the Australian public are really going to appreciate as they roll out, as we have an APS that is more highly able to respond to the needs of individuals as they contact them but also the Australian public as a whole. I commend the bill to the House.

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