Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to be able to speak on this motion that has been brought to the House by the member for Fraser, who, together with the member for Canberra, does a fine job representing the many thousands of public servants. I learnt this firsthand, because I spent many years of my life working with, alongside of, and then defending the interests of public sector employees in this country. Because of that background, I know full well that public servants and public sector employees provide essential services to all Australians.

These are services that we all rely on, whether it is securing our borders through agencies such as the Customs service, the Quarantine and Inspection Service or even our troops on the front line and the people who support those troops. The public sector includes very important but little-known work, like tracking and reporting on unexplained wealth that is associated with criminal networks and bringing that information to the criminal investigative and prosecutorial authorities. The public sector includes the people involved in the engine room of private health care in this country—the staff of Medicare and the staff who are responsible for administering the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme which puts much-needed pharmaceuticals into the hands of literally thousands of Australians who rely on them for their lives.

The public sector includes emergency income support. I see my colleague across the House who represents an electorate that was much affected by the devastating floods in Queensland. The member for Moreton is also here, and his electorate was also affected by this. They would know firsthand the excellent work done by agencies like Centrelink who were in the front line in delivering government sponsored assistance, income support assistance, to those households affected. Millions of Australians—in fact, I understand it is one in four Australians—receive some form of assistance through Centrelink.

The public sector includes our national institutions, which are critical, the cornerstones of our proud democracy. There are the staff who work in this place and the staff who support our courts, our libraries and our museums. Most of us are involved in the day-to-day, week-to-week management of our lives and the businesses that we run, whereas public servants in this country are looking down the track to the sorts of policy settings that are needed to secure the future of this great country.

These are the functions, these are the jobs and these are the people who are often overlooked when we talk about the Australian Public Service, or public servants or bureaucrats or all the other pejoratives which are often tended upon them in the abstract. You will find that there is actually enormous community support for these functions. Unfortunately, they are not always supported in this place, and the contribution by the member for Bradfield is an example of that. Nor are they always supported on this side. These people are often the subject of political attacks from all sides of politics.

Whether it is the disparaging comments that we often hear in this House about 'bureaucrats' or 'fat cats' or 'incompetence' or 'mismanagement', I do not think, for the vast majority of Australian government employees, those sorts of criticisms are well earned. Of course mistakes happen, and when they do happen they should be interrogated and honed out and the people responsible should be appropriately dealt with.

I would like to point to another area where they are not well supported: the efficiency dividend. The efficiency dividend has been in place for over 20 years. The member for Bradfield makes the point that the Public Service should not be treated differently to any other agency and should continually face and find efficiencies. I would argue that, through the efficiency dividend, the Public Service is treated like no other agency or business in that they are continually required to pay between 1.25 per cent and three per cent of their annual running costs back to the government in the form of savings. There is the assumption that there is some sort of magic pudding that continually finds these savings. Worse is to come. If those on the opposite benches have their way, there will be over 12,000 job cuts and more to come. They have form on this. Before the 1996 election they promised 6,000 job cuts by natural attrition. Of course, as a result of what they put in place, we saw over 30,000 jobs lost and Canberra brought into a recession. These are the people on the other side that the member for Fraser— (Time expired)

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