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Whatever Happened to Frank and Fearless? the Impact of New Public Management on the Australian Public Service

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Whatever Happened to Frank and Fearless? the Impact of New Public Management on the Australian Public Service Whatever Happened to Frank and Fearless? The impact of new public management on the Australian Public Service Whatever Happened to Frank and Fearless? The impact of new public management on the Australian Public Service Kathy MacDermott Published by ANU E Press The Australian National University Canberra ACT 0200, Australia Email: [email protected] This title is also available online at: http://epress.anu.edu.au/frank_fearless_citation.html National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Author: MacDermott, Kathy. Title: Whatever happened to frank and fearless? : the impact of the new public service management on the Australian public service / Kathy MacDermott. ISBN: 9781921313912 (pbk.) 9781921313929 (web) Series: ANZSOG series Notes: Bibliography. Subjects: Civil service--Australia. Public administration--Australia. Australia--Politics and government. Dewey Number: 351.94 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Cover design by John Butcher. Printed by University Printing Services, ANU Funding for this monograph series has been provided by the Australia and New Zealand School of Government Research Program. This edition © 2008 ANU E Press John Wanna, Series Editor Professor John Wanna is the Sir John Bunting Chair of Public Administration at the Research School of Social Sciences at The Australian National University. He is the director of research for the Australian and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). He is also a joint appointment with the Department of Politics and Public Policy at Griffith University and a principal researcher with two research centres: the Governance and Public Policy Research Centre and the nationally- funded Key Centre in Ethics, Law, Justice and Governance at Griffith University. Professor Wanna has produced around 17 books including two national text books on policy and public management. He has produced a number of research-based studies on budgeting and financial management including: Budgetary Management and Control (1990); Managing Public Expenditure (2000), From Accounting to Accountability (2001) and, most recently, Controlling Public Expenditure (2003). He has just completed a study of state level leadership covering all the state and territory leaders — entitled Yes Premier: Labor leadership in Australia’s states and territories — and has edited a book on Westminster Legacies in Asia and the Pacific —Westminster Legacies: Democracy and responsible government in Asia and the Pacific. He was a chief investigator in a major Australian Research Council funded study of the Future of Governance in Australia (1999-2001) involving Griffith and the ANU. His research interests include Australian and comparative politics, public expenditure and budgeting, and government-business relations. He also writes on Australian politics in newspapers such as The Australian, Courier-Mail and The Canberra Times and has been a regular state political commentator on ABC radio and TV. Table of Contents Author Profile ix Acknowledgements xi Foreword xiii Overview xv Chapter 1. A failure of public administration? 1 Chapter 2. The regime of contestability 25 Chapter 3. Individual performance management and assessment and ‘assumption cultures’ 43 Chapter 4. Devolution 69 Chapter 5. Aligning the service: the impact of workplace relations 89 Chapter 6. To market, to market: outsourcing the public service 109 Chapter 7. Reforming the reforms? 129 References 137 Appendix: Extract from Chronology no. 1 2002-03 — Changes in the Australian Public Service 1975-2003 151 vii Author Profile Dr Kathy MacDermott has taught in universities in Australia and the United States. More recently, she has worked in the senior executive service of the Australian Public Service in industrial relations policy and public sector governance, and has published in these areas. Her responsibilities have included managing evaluations of how the APS Values and Code of Conduct have been applied in practice and the conduct of the annual State of the Service report. ix Acknowledgements I would like to thank Andrew Podger for reading and rereading the manuscript and providing valuable and patient commentary, John Nethercote for his thorough comments and suggestions, and David Webster for his persistent contribution to quality control. Thanks too to the two anonymous reviewers whose comments and suggestions have contributed to shaping the final product. I would also like to thank the State of the Service team for the important research that they have made publicly available. More generally, I would also like to acknowledge the influence of many public servants with whom I have worked, who continue to struggle with these issues every day and who care about personal and public integrity. Discussions with these people lie behind the hypothetical cases raised in the book. Discussions with Amy Webster and Sarah Webster lie behind the desire to write it in the first place. I am also grateful to ANZSOG and, especially, to John Wanna and John Butcher for their advice throughout the process and to Anne Gelling for her editorial assistance. xi Foreword Dr Kathy MacDermott’s monograph sets out a series of controversial arguments that challenge some widely and strongly held views. Many, like me, continue to regard the New Public Management reforms of the 1980s and 1990s in Australia as groundbreaking, demonstrating how the public sector can deliver efficient and effective services in an internationally competitive economy. Many also of my vintage and older continue to view favourably the Coombs Royal Commission’s other two emphases on responsiveness to the elected government and community participation in government, reinforcing democratic principles and breaking down the hegemony of the public service. And there are strong adherents of the more recent emphasis on performance management and workplace reform. MacDermott does not oppose these reforms, but questions how some have been applied in practice and how they have cumulatively re-positioned public servants and their relationship with the political arm of government. In doing so, some leaders of the reforms will no doubt feel somewhat uncomfortable about aspects of MacDermott’s analysis. This monograph is important. It does not suggest turning back the clock, but seeks reconsideration of some of the effects of the reforms of the last 25 years. Have some gone too far? Have we lost sight of the idealistic aspirations behind some of the reforms? Have there been unintended consequences from some initiatives? Have we let the rhetoric run away from the reality? Importantly, MacDermott looks at the reforms from the perspective of public servants down the line, not just departmental secretaries. What is the context in which they now operate and what behaviours do they believe the system expects of them today? In particular, are they encouraged to be responsive to the point where they compromise their duty to be apolitical and impartial and concerned for the public interest? Some of the challenges MacDermott identifies are: • the extent to which contestability of policy advice is improving the contest for ideas or enhancing the ability of governments to find the advice they want; • the extent to which performance management is improving organisational performance or reinforcing pressure to conform; • the extent to which devolution has enhanced flexibility to deliver better results or has involved a trade-off of policy influence for managerial control, with public servants subject to closer direction by both managers and by ministerial advisers and ministers; xiii Whatever Happened to Frank and Fearless? • the extent to which workforce reforms in the public sector have increased flexibility and enhanced employees’ capacity to identify with and contribute to organisational objectives, or have disempowered employees, discouraged teamwork and reduced innovation and professional autonomy; • the extent to which outsourcing has improved efficiency and effectiveness through competition or has undermined altruism and concern for the public interest both within the public service and amongst the non-government sector. I do not agree with all of MacDermott’s conclusions, although I know of real instances that are consistent with almost all of her hypothetical cases and I know well that the APS Commission survey data confirm widespread unease amongst public servants. In a few cases, however, I think that unease is just misplaced; in other cases, there is indeed supporting evidence reinforcing the need to revisit current practice, for example in performance management and workplace relations. More generally, MacDermott’s plea for a firmer focus on public value strikes a chord with me. Public servants do want to serve the elected government, but they want to be recognised by government and the public for their contribution to the public interest by their professionalism. The opportunity to serve the public remains the greatest attraction to join the public service, and the greatest motivator to perform. If not managed appropriately some of the reforms, notwithstanding their intrinsic merits, do present a danger of undermining this fundamental value which drives the public service. Andrew Podger xiv Overview Under s.10(1)(a) of the Public Service Act 1999 (hereafter referred to as the Public Service Act) the
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