Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

[by video link] We need to invest in our public servants and not hand their roles to private companies for profit. It is the Public Service, with its developed processes, corporate knowledge and culture, that enables good governance, accountability and high-quality service provision and can always be counted on to put the public interest first. So imagine the community's dismay that the privatisation of the Australian Public Service is continuing at a staggering rate. For instance, documents obtained by michaelwest.com.au show that the number of outsourced staff in Defence is 1½ times the number of public servants. The Attorney-General's Department spent $13.4 million on labour hire contractors last financial year. Home Affairs outsourced 1,082 positions, including intelligence analysts, legal practitioners and border enforcement officers. Nearly 40 per cent of department of infrastructure staff is outsourced, including 16 assistant directors, and 5,000 positions in the ATO's call centres are outsourced. Frankly, there's simply no transparency in outsourced arrangements, no certainty that information is protected and no guarantee that the highest quality services will be delivered. About the only thing that's for sure is that the contract workers will be worse off than their predecessors and that their employers will pocket tidy profits, all of which is a nonsense. It must end.