Andrew Murray (WA, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

Sometimes these debates remind me of debates when people say, ‘Your husband is ugly,’ and you then start debating how ugly the other person’s husband is. I think of our great Australian cricket team: if they can be criticised and asked to lift their game, so can the Howard government. Nobody should be immune from criticism. Having said that, I think some of the criticism is somewhat misplaced. There are four considerable items on this notice for debate, and I have only five minutes to deal with my views on them, so I doubt I will get through much more than item 1.

Under item 1, ‘the weak financial discipline of the Howard government and in particular the failure of the finance minister, Senator Minchin,’ the minister is criticised because:

The recent audit office report that found more than one third of agencies administering programmes had no performance indicators to address their effectiveness, quality or cost.

Frankly, I think that is unfair to Senator Minchin. His real problem is that he lacks power. He lacks the power to tell the portfolio ministers to put performance indicators against their programs. He lacks the authority to do that. The minister for finance exists in an advisory capacity in those matters; he cannot tell another minister or another agency, because of the devolved nature of the system, to put in performance indicators and other matters such as that, unless he is given that authority by the cabinet or it is specific to the powers that he has.

One of the things people do not appreciate enough about the public sector is that there is no regulator. The Australian National Audit Office is an auditor, not a regulator; the Department of Finance and Administration is not a regulator. Neither of those bodies can require ministers and their departments to provide such things as performance indicators. In the private sector we do have a regulator—the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. When you have a problem with, for instance, the public accounting or reporting in specific areas where ASIC has responsibility, the regulator is able to go to the company concerned and ask it to ensure that its market announcements are correct, that its share dealings are up to scratch if it is interacting with the ASX, or that the prospectus is true and fair in its pronouncements.

I have argued for a long time that, if any government wants to improve its ability to require the financial officers and the chief executives of government agencies to fulfil their remits, you need a Public Service regulator with the powers to do so. I have raised this issue over a number of years with the finance department. They understand what I am on about and are interested in the concept, but it is a very difficult one to get around because, in the end, it means that ministers and their chief executives will, to some extent, be under a system of enforcement and not under a system of sole responsibility.

I think that in many respects the finance minister and his department produce some superb guidelines, guidance notes and directions which are not capable of enforcement and are not internalised in the agencies’ culture. All the Audit Office can do is draw the government’s attention to them. I think that if there is a failing of the finance minister it is that he has failed to find a solution to this particular problem.

When you look at items 2, 3 and 4, which refer to cost blow-outs, lack of public disclosure and not being properly approved by cabinet, the responsibility for those rests with the chief executive. It is ultimately Mr Howard’s responsibility to ensure that his government does not fall into those failings. If there is criticism to be raised by the Labor Party with this motion, it has to be directed primarily at the Prime Minister for these shortcomings and not at the finance minister. In the end, blaming the finance minister would be equivalent to ASIC—(Time expired)