INADEQUACIES IN THE PROCESSES OF POLICY DEVELOPMENT IN AUSTRALIA

Abstract: Policy and policy development have received considerable attention in Australia over the last decade or more. This attention has resulted in many recommendations on policy in the series of major public service inquiries of the 1970s, in a number of books and journal articles on varied aspects of public policy, and in the considerable strengthening of the policy development capacities of many government agencies. This attention has to date been inadequate, because it has in almost all cases concentrated on the questions of where within the bureaucratic structure policy development should occur and what procedural mechanisms are needed to allow ministers or cabinet to choose between alternative policies and to facilitate the coordination of policies. These questions are of course important, but questions of how a well-considered policy option that can be considered by a cabinet or a minister is actually developed appear to have been almost totally ignored. In the public service inquiries, in the published literature, and in public accounts of the work of policy units, there appears to be virtually no analysis of the process of policy development. There is little or no discussion of how the standard formal models of policy development match or fail to match the techniques used in Australia, and although there have been many individual case studies of policy issues, there are no comparative case studies from which general observations might be drawn. Lastly, there are very few positive suggestions as to how policy development in Australia could be improved. Overcoming these inadequacies provides a major challenge to Australian policy workers.     

THE IMAGE OF THE PUBLIC ADMINISTRATOR IN AUSTRALIA*

After the recent Federal elections, I am more confident in saying that I do not always believe the polls. In this instance, I have the feeling that the image of public administrators in Australia is probably worse than the surveys indicated. The latest bumper bar sticker in Canberra reads: “Fight inflation, run over a public servant today”. The Australian is running a series of articles critical of the size, efficiency and effectiveness of public services. The cup-of-tea image is a popular one and kick-a-public-servant-today has every possibility of developing into a national sport; the “fat cat” image has caught on.     

THE PRIVATISATION OF HUMAN SERVICES IN AUSTRALIA: HAS IT HAPPENED?

Abstract: The privatisation of Australia's public services has been one of the major challenges facing public administration since the early 1980s. Its enthusiastic proponents and their equally fervent opponents have generated considerable controversy. Yet its impact may have been exaggerated. A number of writers have deplored its spread in Australia's human services. Yet their evidence for privatisation does not stand scrutiny. As well, if privatisation had occurred, it would have had an impact upon the flow of public finance and that should be reflected in public finance data. An examination of that data provides almost no support for the claim that the 1980s saw significant privatisation of Australia's human services.
The current debate on privatisation … indicates a movement to return social welfare provision to sectors or systems other than government (ACOSS 1989 p.6).
The re-emergence of the voluntary sector has been facilitated by public policies designed to transfer responsibility for welfare services from the government to the non-government sector (Baldock 1990, p. 109).
with the more systematic transfer of services to the non-governmental sector (Baldock 1990, p. 113).
over the past two decades … a number of functions such as service delivery and management have been transferred from the state in a way that in most terms amounts to privatisation (NCOSS 1989, p.2).
This rebirth of the non-government sector can arguably be seen as a privatisation of the welfare state (NCOSS 1989, p.22).
Human services in New South Wales have been and continue to be the subject of a wide range of reviews intended to produce changes which fit under the general rubric of "privatisation" (Evatt Research Centre 1989, p.208).
The moves towards privatisation, if they are to continue, will have serious long term consequences (Graycar & Jamrozik 1989, p.296).     

THE DELIMITATION OF GOVERNMENT REGIONS AND STATISTICAL AREAS IN AUSTRALIA

Over the past decade State and Commonwealth governments in Australia have become increasingly concerned with the regional scale of activity where region, defined at its broadest, refers to an area which is larger than the Local Government Area (LGA) and smaller than the State. This concern arose in part with belief that "some programs and services of government are most efficiently and effectively planned, coordinated and delivered at a level intermediate to those of State and Local Government". This in turn reflected the growth in importance of the regional scale for the whole gamut of social and economic functioning. Rapid technological changes in transport and communication; the tremendous growth in personal mobility over the past 30 years; the rapid urban growth; the powerful organizing role of urban centres and the increasing interdependence of town and country have all made the regional unit a very significant spatial and functional entity which it is impossible to ignore when organizing activity of any sort. In particular this "shrinkage of space" has enabled both public and private sector activity to be organized effectively over much larger areas than previously, while technological changes have increased the scale at which many services, especially those involving physical plant, are most efficiently performed.     

THE GOVERNMENT AND HOSPITAL COMMITTEES OF MANAGEMENT IN VICTORIA

Abstract: A new method has recently been introduced for selecting members of Victorian hospital committees of management: they are to be appointed by the Minister of Health, instead of being nominally elected by "contributors" to the hospitals. The 1977 Health Commission Act, which contains these new appointment provisions, gives the state government additional powers over the hospitals, and the power to appoint committees of management could contribute to this augmented control. The new method of selection, however, is expected to make little difference in practice to the committees. Neither the former Liberal state government, in framing the Health Commission Act, nor recent official inquiries have considered seriously the capacity of these committees as they are now constituted to maintain a high degree of hospital autonomy, despite the hospitals' heavy reliance on public funds. By leaving undisturbed these inheritors of the voluntary hospital tradition, the former Liberal government, though it has left its Labor successor with some new powers, has left it also with a potential obstacle to implementing the kinds of reforming measures recommended for the state's health services.     

AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND: THE ROLE OF AGRICULTURE IN A CLOSER ECONOMIC RELATIONSHIP

An economic trade agreement between Australia and New Zealand has cemented international relations between them and aided their development. A t the center of that trade agreement is agriculture commodities. This study examines the motives to the agreement, i t s difficulties, political and economic considerations, and i t s generally positive impact on both countries.     

THE POLITICS OF ROAD FUNDING: REMOTE ABORIGINAL COMMUNITIES AND FEDERALISM IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Abstract: This paper illustrates how remote Aboriginal communities shape rural road classification and funding policies in three Western Australian shires. The Australian federal system is characterised by a complex range of commonwealth and state governmental agencies competing for political space within different localities. Because Aborigines are constituents of the commonwealth and the state, a distinction is drawn between local government political activity, and politics that occur within the locality of a shire.
Success in influencing policy-making processes throughout the federal system stems from the participants' ability to exploit the system. The Aboriginal impact on road policy-making within remote localities is linked to electoral, bureaucratic, and sectional interest politics. These are features of governing and they provide a conceptual framework for the organisation of political activity by commonwealth, state, and local agencies, and Aboriginal communities.     

THE FORGOTTEN ROYAL COMMISSION: PUBLIC SERVICE REFORM IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

The publication Public Service Inquiries in Australia edited by R.F.I Smith and Patrick Weller (1978) concentrated on the wave of inquiries that swept Australia in the 1970s with most attention being given to the Royal Commission on Australian Government Administration (RCAGA). While the focus of the book was on contemporary developments, Roger Wettenhall's chapter 2 outlined "A Brief History of Public Service Inquiries" so as "to set the present generation of inquiries more firmly in a historical context" (1978, p.15).