Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business and Fair Competition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this morning to speak on behalf of the opposition on both of these bills before the Senate—one, the Public Service Amendment Bill 2012, a government bill and one, the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill 2012, a private senator's bill introduced by the President of the Senate. The two bills are in response to the report Ahead of the game: blueprint for reform of Australian government administration, which was released in March 2010. There was a committee of inquiry underway into this particular report by the Senate's Finance and Public Administration Committee, which was, sadly, put off by the election and the committee did not have a chance to renew that inquiry. I would also note that it was announced that many of the recommendations from that inquiry were in fact not going to be implemented by the new government after the 2010 election.

First I would like to mention some important context to this bill. Today there are around 160,000 people employed by the Australian Public Service spread throughout government departments based all around the country but naturally focused here in Canberra. They have different backgrounds, experiences and come from all kinds and walks of life—indeed, I have some in my own family. Whether it is issuing a passport, solving a Centrelink inquiry or costing tax policies, they all play a crucial role in developing and administering public policy of this country. Everyday decisions they make and the work that they do impact Australians in every walk of life, so it is important for the wellbeing of our country that these tasks are carried out professionally and with integrity.

I would first like to deal with the government's Public Service Amendment Bill, which is being taken this morning with the other bill. This bill makes a number of amendments to the Public Service Act 1999, most of which are minor in nature, relating to the code of conduct of public servants and changing the values and employment principles for APS employees. So it is an important bill. It is an important bill because we need to make sure we have an impartial Public Service that operates with excellence and integrity. In the explanatory memorandum of this bill it states its purpose is to:

… strengthen the management and leadership of the Public Service and to help embed new practices and behaviours into its culture.

This is a good purpose and the opposition on the whole believes the amendment bill achieves this.

But first let me correct a myth that has been put about by some on the other side of this change—both the Labor Party and their coalition colleagues the Greens. The coalition supports the Australian Public Service. It supports a strong Australian Public Service. We believe in an efficient and good Public Service, because that makes for good and efficient administration of this country. I would suggest that over the course of this nation, since the employment of the first public servant, who I believe was Robert Garran in 1901, our country has been relatively well served and particularly so when we look at comparable nations. So we support this amendment bill because we believe the Public Service is an integral part of good government in this country.

We also note that the government has accepted a proposed amendment by the opposition in the other place and we believe that strengthens this bill as well. The concerns that we had, and which are reflected in the amendment the government accepted, were not with the Public Service itself but with the government's treatment of the Public Service. What concerned us most was that the initial draft of the bill gave the Prime Minister greater power to extend the employment of departmental secretaries, allowing the Prime Minister to give new positions to secretaries who have resigned or whose contracts have ended. This allowance essentially undid a lot of good work the bill achieved about process and merit within the Public Service and, in our view, violated the five consolidated principles that the bill outlines for the Public Service.

The most notable example of this, of course, was the appointment of Dr Ken Henry under section 67 of the Constitution by the Prime Minister upon his departure as Secretary of the Treasury. The opposition had previously in estimates hearings in this place expressed concerns about this appointment, given that it had previously been rarely used and only, shall we say, for the most sensitive of appointments that a government can make with respect to security agencies. So this bill does limit the ability of the Prime Minister to make unilateral decisions with respect to the Public Service and appointments of secretaries, and we support that.

I would now like to turn to the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill. This is a bill that naturally reflects the same report undertaken by the government—Ahead of the game: blueprint for reform of Australian government administration, the blueprint that I mentioned earlier. This bill amends the Parliamentary Service Act and runs in parallel to, but naturally is distinct from, the Public Service. It is important that there be an independent Parliamentary Service. It is important that this parliament can draw upon what I think everyone in this chamber would agree is the extraordinary ethical contribution and the long hours that people who work in the Parliamentary Service do to facilitate us in doing our job. We support the separate Parliamentary Service, but running it along the same lines as the Public Service, with merit protection and other processes, is also very important because the Parliamentary Service and the Public Service do benefit from cross-fertilisation—people moving between the two occasionally—and we do need to have a system that gives employees confidence in their employment arrangements and their careers and that also gives the confidence that I think we hold in the Parliamentary Service. So the opposition supports the principles in this bill and the amendments to the bill that are moved. Where there are slight differences from the Public Service Amendment Bill, that of course reflects the different nature of the Parliamentary Service. I would also like to note that there have been some amendments to this bill circulated by the President of the Senate, and the opposition will be supporting those amendments as they bring the bill into line with the amendments made as appropriate to the Public Service Amendment Bill. So the opposition will be supporting both these bills and the amendments to the Parliamentary Service Bill moved by the President of the Senate.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to support this very important bill, the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill 2012 [2013]. It seeks to amend the Parliamentary Service Act 1999 to reflect, where relevant to the Parliamentary Service, the changes that are proposed to be made to the Public Service Act 1999 by the Public Service Amendment Bill 2012. Although many of the provisions of the Public Service Amendment Bill are reflected in this bill, there are a range of provisions in the bill which are not reflected in the Public Service Amendment Bill and vice versa. Therefore, whilst it is fair to say that the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill runs closely in conjunction with the Public Service Amendment Bill, it is a distinct bill that contains key differences.

This bill, along with the Public Service Amendment Bill 2012, responds to the recommendations of the March 2010 report Ahead of the game: blueprint for the reform of Australian government administration. The blueprint outlined a reform agenda to strengthen Australian Public Service performance so that it meets the needs of all citizens, provides strong leadership and strategic direction, contains a highly capable workforce and operates efficiently at a high standard. It was developed jointly by the Parliamentary Service departments in consultation with the Parliamentary Service Commissioner and introduced into the Senate in November last year. Following introduction, it was referred to the Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee for inquiry and report so that it could be compared with the provisions contained in the Public Service Amendment Bill. These amendments are an important part of modernising the Parliamentary Service. They are part of the continuous process of improvement that it must undergo to face the challenges of the future.

It is important to make a comparison of this bill and the Public Service Amendment Bill because, as alluded to earlier, the two contain some differences. Various items in the bill do not reflect provisions contained in the Public Service Amendment Bill, including amendments relating to acting arrangements that have already been made to the Public Service Act and miscellaneous amendments that achieve consistency with the relevant sections of the Public Service Act. In addition to this, the bill does not contain numerous changes being made in the Public Service Amendment Bill. This bill will not, for example, provide for an annual review of the performance of secretaries in the Parliamentary Service.

The main features of the bill make notable changes to the roles and responsibilities of secretaries in the Parliamentary Service, the functions of the Parliamentary Service Commissioner and the relevant code of conduct. The bill clarifies and revises the description of the roles and responsibilities of secretaries, as well as of the Senior Executive Service, to ensure that the Parliamentary Service has the organisational and workforce capacities to meet the needs of the future. The existing responsibilities of the secretaries, including managing their departments and providing information about the operation and administration of their departments, will remain. However, the secretaries would also be tasked with a host of new responsibilities such as providing stewardship in the departments and across the Parliamentary Service with other secretaries; engaging with stakeholders; and providing strategic direction and leadership. The amendments are designed to expand on the role of the secretaries so that departmental affairs are managed as efficiently, effectively, economically and ethically as possible and in keeping with the overall interests of the Parliamentary Service.

The functions of Senior Executive Service employees, or SES employees, will also be further defined and expanded. The amendments will fundamentally recast the chief functions of the SES group and focus on these employees providing superior strategic leadership. Individual SES employees will be expected to provide one or more of the following at a high level: professional or specialist expertise; policy advice; program or service delivery; and regulatory administration.

One of the most notable aspects of this bill is that it will also substantially redesign the functions of the Parliamentary Service Commissioner. The commissioner will be charged with new responsibilities, including inquiring into Parliamentary Service employees' reports of breaches of the Parliamentary Service Code of Conduct. The amendments will also provide that when the commissioner is examining these whistleblower reports, such as a conflict of interest or the contravention of an Australian law, the commissioner will have information-gathering powers equivalent to those of the Auditor-General. This is, of course, necessary to adequately probe whistleblower reports and uncover information which has the potential to expose widespread conduct breaches. The bill will also introduce new amendments to protect the information given to the commissioner under the new inquiry functions, as well as existing responsibilities such as inquiring into matters relating to the commissioner at the request of the Presiding Officers. Although the commissioner will be allowed to disclose this protected information in certain situations, such as in reports prepared for purposes connected with these inquiry functions, they will otherwise be prohibited from making a record, disclosing, or otherwise using this information. This is a vital amendment, as it adds an additional layer of protection to potentially sensitive information held by the commissioners to ensure that it remains confidential.

The amendments will also make the provision of information and documents to the commissioner inadmissible as evidence against a person in proceedings, other than for certain criminal offences. This will be the case where the person reasonably believed that the information or document was relevant for purposes connected with the performance or exercise of the commissioner's functions. This amendment is vital, as it protects those Parliamentary Service employees who have provided information to the commissioner that assists the commissioner in performing his or her duties. This bill makes key changes to the existing framework governing the Office of the Parliamentary Service Merit Protection Commissioner. The Merit Protection Commissioner will also be able to undertake whistleblowing inquiries into possible breaches of the code of conduct, where requested to do so by the relevant secretary and agreed to by the Parliamentary Service employee. The Merit Protection Commissioner will have information-gathering powers equivalent to the Auditor-General when undertaking such inquiries and will be charged with establishing written procedures for code of conduct breach inquiries. Like the Public Service Commissioner, the Merit Protection Commissioner will be subject to confidentiality of information requirements in connection with the information received during the performance or exercise of the commissioner's functions. The amendments will also make the provision of information and documents to the Merit Protection Commissioner inadmissible as evidence against a person in proceedings, other than for certain criminal offences.

The bill proposes significant changes to the provisions of the Parliamentary Service Act that deal with whistleblowing and whistleblower reports. Departmental secretaries will be required to establish procedures for handling whistleblower reports, including a clear pathway for the making of reports, so that all employees are encouraged to blow the whistle on possible breaches of the code of conduct. This will ensure that those employees who are considering blowing the whistle on possible breaches of the code of conduct will have greater guidance on how they can achieve this.

The amendments will also seek to implement the blueprint recommendations to repeal the existing Parliamentary Service values and insert five new values together with seven new Parliamentary Service Employment Principles relating to employment decisions and workplace standards. This creates a smaller set of core values that are more meaningful, memorable and effective in driving change as well as reinforcing the positive cultural environment for a high-performing Parliamentary Service. Every Parliamentary Service employee can look at this new set of streamlined principles and remind themselves of the importance of being committed to service as well as remaining ethical, respectful, accountable and impartial.

The introduction of a set of Parliamentary Service Employment Principles in the bill replicates the Australian Public Service Employment Principles contained in the Public Service Amendment Bill. These new principles will state that the Parliamentary Service is a career based service that makes fair employment decisions with a fair system of review, requires effective performance from each employee and provides workplaces that are free from discrimination, patronage and favouritism. The principles will also recognise the diversity of the Australian community and foster diversity in the workplace, and provide flexible, safe and rewarding workplaces where communication, consultation, cooperation and input from employees on matters that affect their workplace are valued.

The new Parliamentary Service values and employment principles together define the character of the Parliamentary Service as an institution and guide the way in which it conducts its activities and serves the Australian community and the government. They provide robust guidance on the culture and operating ethos of the Parliamentary Service and underscore its professionalism. This ensures that the Parliamentary Service will continue to provide professional support of the highest calibre to all parliamentarians, independent of the executive government of the day.

This government strongly believes in modernising the Parliamentary Service, and these amendments are an important aspect of that. Improving the operations of the Parliamentary Service is an ongoing process that requires immense commitment to ensure that government is equipped to confront the challenges of the future. All parliamentarians depend on a professional, nonpartisan Parliamentary Service. After more than a decade since the Parliamentary Service was created, this bill will ensure that the service can continue to provide a high level of support and advice, which will ultimately benefit the wider Australian community. I commend the bill to the Senate.

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Public Service Amendment Bill 2012 seeks to simplify and refine the values that guide the Australian Public Service down to five key principles: the APS is to be committed to service, be ethical, respectful, accountable and, of course, impartial. To that effect, the bill contains numerous provisions of a technical and administrative nature which seek, among other things, to delineate the roles and responsibilities of departmental secretaries and provide for annual reviews of secretaries' performance and further define the functions and roles of the Senior Executive Service of the APS.

The bill is long and detailed, but I want to focus this morning on one particular provision, namely, the one that establishes the Secretaries Board as the lead forum of the Australian Public Service. The board will replace the Management Advisory Committee, which has played that lead role since 1999. In many ways, the bill merely codifies the status quo, as the Secretaries Board has already been in existence for the past two years. The board is to be the principal APS senior leadership group, composed of the secretaries of all the departments, the Commissioner of the Australian Public Service and such others as may be nominated by the secretary of the Prime Minister's department.

The bill enumerates the board's functions. It will have responsibility for the stewardship of the APS and for developing and implementing strategies to improve the APS. It will identify strategic priorities for the APS and consider issues that affect the Public Service. It will set an annual work program, direct subcommittees to develop strategies to address Public Service-wide issues and make recommendations back to the Secretaries Board. It will draw together advice from senior leaders in government, business and the community. All these roles and responsibilities, as all senators would agree, are very important. I hope that the board will provide the APS with the necessary leadership to tackle issues and problems that affect the Public Service as a whole—the entire Australian Public Service.

One such issue, which I have raised many times over the years, is Public Service absenteeism. It is one that I have pursued for the past eight years through Senate estimates, in government and out of government, as well as in this chamber, most recently about three months ago. The facts are simple: the rates of unscheduled absence in the Public Service have been increasing steadily over the past 10 or so years. In 2001-02, the median unscheduled absence rate was 8.9 days per year per employee, of which sick leave accounted for seven days and other types of leave for the remaining 1.9 days. In 2010-11, the rate of unscheduled absence climbed to 11.1 days per year per employee, of which sick leave accounted for 8.4 days. This means that in nine years, unscheduled absences in the Australian Public Service increased by 25 per cent, or 2.2 days per year per employee. The median figure hides a great divergence across government departments and agencies, with the levels of workplace absence varying widely from 3.9 days per employee all the way up to 23½ days per year per employee. There is a huge disparity between unscheduled absences across Public Service agencies. And 23.5 days median absence is a lot—that is almost five working weeks and, combined with four weeks of annual leave, this means that some employees are not at work for almost nine weeks, or two months, a year.

This is not generally the experience of those working in the private sector. While reliable data is hard to come by—and I will come back to that in a minute—Direct Health Solutions in their 2011 absence management survey reported that while absence levels across Australia fell for the first time in three years, public sector employees took 22½ per cent more time off than those in the private sector. Why this great divergence between the Public Service and the private sector, and why have the rates of absenteeism in the Public Service increased by 25 per cent over the last decade? Why? I wish I had the answer—indeed, I wish anyone had the answer.

Over the years I have received various suggestions from the Australian Public Service Commission as to why. One year, the absences were blamed on a particularly bad flu season. Another year I was told that the Public Service has an older age profile than the private sector, the implication being that the older you are the sicker you get. The APS is certainly more middle-aged that the rest of the Australian workforce, but it actually has fewer older workers than the private sector. In any case, the Public Service Commission does not actually collect data on absences per various age groups so the proposition that the age profile accounts for increasing absenteeism is merely guesswork and a hypothesis not supported by any collected data. The bottom line is that the commission does not know what is really causing this problem.

This might explain why over the past eight years I have been disappointed by the efforts that the commission has been putting in to tackle this issue. After all, if you do not know what is causing the problem, it is unlikely that you will be able to find a solution. When earlier this year I questioned the commissioner, Mr Stephen Sedgwick, as to whether he has a responsibility to act to reduce absenteeism, he answered:

I do not actually manage a hundred agencies across the Australian Public Service; I manage my own.

…   …   …

But we are quite keen—and we have—to share good practice and that is what we tend to do. In these circumstances we encourage good practice and we promulgate good practice.

As far as I have been able to discover, all this encouragement and promulgation of good practice seems to have been contained to the publication in 2006—two years after I first raised the issue of absenteeism with the commission—of a document called Fostering an attendance culture: a guide for APS agencies. It was a good document but, as I recently discovered, it has not been updated or reissued since 2006.

Apart from that, I also discovered that absenteeism has not been placed even once on the agenda of the Management Advisory Committee or that of its successor, the Secretaries Board, for the past five years. I have been told, though, that absenteeism has been taken up at internal human resources management forums. That might be the case, but numbers speak for themselves—a 25 per cent increase in unscheduled absences by Australian public servants in the past 10 years. One might think that this issue deserves deep consideration by the APS's lead forums.

At the Senate estimates in October last year the committee finally received a commitment from the commissioner that the issue of Public Service absenteeism will now be put on the agenda of the Secretaries Board, where it belongs. As I look at the board's functions, as enumerated in the bill before the Senate, it is clear that tackling the problem of high and constantly-increasing absenteeism is a clear instance of where the board needs to be—and I quote from the bill—'developing and implementing strategies to improve the APS'. As the board identifies 'strategic priorities for the APS' and considers 'issues that affect the APS', I hope that reducing absenteeism will be one such issue. I hope that the board will finally provide the much-needed focus and leadership to address this problem.

The new APS principles state that the Public Service is to be committed to service and to being ethical, respectful, accountable and impartial. A Public Service that is committed to service and that is accountable to the parliament and to the taxpayers is one that needs to put the issue of absenteeism high on its agenda and, more importantly, to act to finally address the problem, because it does not seem to be going away. I will certainly continue to watch this issue with considerable interest.

Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank all senators for their contributions to the debate on the Public Service Amendment Bill 2012, and also on the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill 2012 [2013]. This bill makes landmark changes to the Public Service Act 1999. The bill will help to modernise the governance of the Australian Public Service, and in many ways will enable world’s best practice in public service management. The bill will improve the quality of workforce management in the Australian Public Service, and this will translate into better service provision for the Australian public.

The amendments implement the recommendations of Ahead of the game: blueprint for the reform of Australian government administration. In particular there are: improved governance arrangements for APS leadership, including reforms that will strengthen the independence of secretaries and provide a clear statement of their role; a clearer, shorter statement of APS values, blending contemporary ethical approaches with enduring principles of public administration that go to the heart of the Westminster model; reforms that set out more clearly the role of the Australian Public Service Commissioner as a central authority for the development and stewardship of the Australian Public Service; and practical improvements to the Public Service Act that address a number of operational matters that have arisen since the last major changes in 1999. The reforms proposed in the report Ahead of the game and implemented through this bill will provide Australia with a modern employment framework for its public service. It will bring greater agility and responsiveness to the government, and this will pay dividends to the Australian community.

The bill strengthens governance arrangements for Australian Public Service leadership, including provisions concerning the appointment and termination of departmental secretaries. The bill will restore the ‘gold standard’ arrangement that supported the integrity and consistency of our public sector for generations. As was the case before 1999, the Governor-General will have the responsibility of appointing departmental secretaries, acting on the advice of the Prime Minister. Having the Governor-General make these appointments will underscore the impartiality of the Australian Public Service, and will promote public confidence in its leadership.

Following the introduction of the bill into the House of Representatives, the government has moved two largely technical amendments which, with the support of the opposition, were passed by the House. The amendments concern the engagement of non-ongoing employees, and the protection of information and immunity from suit provisions applying to the Public Service Commissioner, the Merit Protection Commissioner and other ‘entrusted persons’ in the course of the commissioners’ review and inquiry functions. The government amendments have ensured that these provisions will operate effectively.

The government has also supported amendments moved by the opposition during debate in the House in the interests of achieving meaningful reform supported across the parliament. These amendments relate to arrangements for the engagement of former secretaries. In response to matters raised by the Scrutiny of Bills Committee, the government has tabled an addendum to the revised explanatory memorandum for the bill. The addendum provides additional information on handling suspected misconduct by Australian Public Service employees, including those who provide false or misleading information when applying for employment in the Public Service.

I understand Senator Milne has proposed amendments concerning protection for whistleblowers who make reports under the Public Service Act. I thank Senator Milne for her interest in this matter. Some of the amendments proposed deal with matters that are already included within the bill. For example, proposed sections 72C and 72D of the amendment bill make clear that people who provide information related to a whistleblowing report to the Public Service Commissioner or the Merit Protection Commissioner are protected against civil and criminal penalties.

I also thank Senator Mason for raising the matter of unscheduled absences in the APS. This has clearly been an area of interest for Senator Mason for some time. As Senator Mason acknowledged, agencies have prime responsibility for managing workplace absences and it is a matter that they and the government take very seriously. But I can advise Senator Mason that the Secretaries Board has discussed this matter and that the Australian Public Service Commission is monitoring developments to inform further reports to the board.

The government takes seriously the protection of public officials who report in good faith serious misconduct or maladministration. Indeed, the government is developing a comprehensive public interest disclosure scheme which includes including strengthened protection for whistleblowers. The government does not, therefore, support the Greens amendments to this bill.

The debate this morning has concerned both the Public Service Amendment Bill and the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill. The decision in 1999 to have a distinct, separate Parliamentary Service, albeit with generally similar terms and conditions to the Public Service, has served the Australian community well for the last decade. The proposed amendments to the Parliamentary Service Act closely reflect the amendments to the Public Service Act. I am informed that the bill is intended to ensure that the Parliamentary Service will continue to be able to serve the federal legislature and through it the Australian people professionally and in a nonpartisan manner. On behalf of our President, I commend the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill to the Senate.

In summary, the Public Service Amendment Bill responds to the reform agenda of the Advisory Group on Reform of Australian Government Administration, whose recommendations were accepted by government. The Australian Public Service is fundamental to the success of our country and our society. The commitment and expertise of our Public Service directly affects the lives of all Australians. A healthy Public Service is a vital part of Australia’s democratic system of government. Australians have high expectations. They quite rightly expect quality service, honesty and integrity, and value for their taxpayer dollar from the Public Service. The bill will support a Public Service that is agile and responsive to a rapidly changing world, meeting the legitimate needs of the Australian community and the government of the day both now and into the future.

I thank senators for their support for this bill and commend both bills to the Senate.

Question agreed to.

Bills read a second time.