This Month
Contractors in the firing line as public service headcount soars
The number of bureaucrats has increased nearly 10 per cent in one year alone and some $1.8 billion has been allocated to overhaul staffing at Services Australia.
- Tom Burton
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Why headcount matters when it comes to budgets
As any finance chief will attest, the number of bums on seats tells you most of what you need to know about an organisation’s underlying size and costs.
- Tom Burton
Size of Victorian government to be cut for first time in 15 years
Tight control over salaries and operating expenses will result in reduced average expenditure of 2.2 per cent over forward estimates.
- Tom Burton
Domestic violence rates fall over decades but one stat hasn’t changed
The rate of women killed by their partners has fallen by two-thirds over the past 34 years, but women remain twice as likely as men to be victims of intimate partner homicide.
- Tom Burton
Treat violent men like terrorists or gangsters, experts say
Swift sanctions, including jail, are needed to stop domestic violence, say researchers, who argue no amount of “respectful relationships training” will stop some men.
- Tom Burton
April
- Opinion
- National security
Pezzullo takes first step to redemption
The former Home Affairs secretary admitted his mistakes and accepted his disgrace, and knows he will not be working with the Commonwealth for some time.
- Tom Burton
Federal contract bidders will need to hit sustainability targets
Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek said government departments would use their purchasing power to reduce waste and promote recycling, part of new reporting rules.
- Tom McIlroy
- Opinion
- Workplace culture
Taxpayers should be furious over public service’s ‘ghost’ offices
On a recent Friday in Canberra, a deflated public servant friend revealed that there were only three people at work on a floor space that can seat 30 to 40.
- Updated
- John Kehoe
Meet the doctors whose virtual ED is easing the load on hospitals
In outer Melbourne, a virtual emergency department has offered 250,000 patients treatment and created a model to help keep ageing Baby Boomers out of hospital.
- Tom Burton
APRA’s lavish $70,000 Christmas Party
Do you think all that time peering over the expenses of financial institutions has induced a spot of envy within the APRA social committee?
- Updated
- Myriam Robin
- Opinion
- Government Observed
The Senate’s mock outrage games shame all
Threatening corporate leaders with jail time over an accounting contrivance is part of a trend where the national parliament is becoming a theatre for showboating and mock outrage.
- Tom Burton
- Analysis
- Government Observed
Why government has an Excel problem
Swaths of the public service still have to use tools and manual procedures from the early 1980s, when desktop computing first arrived in government.
- Tom Burton
Finance’s ‘basic’ spreadsheet error triggers reform calls
The federal Finance department failed to remove hidden tabs in a master spreadsheet, exposing confidential pricing data, a review has found.
- Tom Burton
March
New system to track labour hire in government
A new Department of Finance database will provide the first-ever consolidated view of the use of labour hire throughout the federal government.
- Edmund Tadros
‘Legacy of fear’: government watchdog fires parting shot at Andrews
Victoria’s outgoing ombudsman Deborah Glass has warned about the ‘dangerous impact of creeping ‘politicisation’ on the state’s public service.
- Gus McCubbing
COVID-19 inquiry boss vows to find ‘missing piece’
Commonwealth review chief Robyn Kruk says the community should feel confident the nation can deal with the next pandemic.
- Tom Burton
- Analysis
- Inside Government
Health chief invokes ‘AFR test’ in proposal writing overhaul
Blair Comley has applied what he calls “the AFR test” as he pushes executives in his federal health department to write and think more clearly.
- Tom Burton
How ‘deliberate reflection’ and being a ‘list zealot’ help this leader
Competition expert Professor Caron Beaton-Wells runs up to eight lists on her phone and manages them ruthlessly. “That immediately makes me feel like it’s all manageable”.
- Tom Burton
- Analysis
- Government Observed
Could turning laws into code help fix the housing shortage?
Allowing computers to read and interpret laws based on sophisticated rules could revolutionise regulation and the way you interact with government.
- Tom Burton
Some jobs ‘you can’t do from your lounge room’, public servants told
Many jobs – such as those carried out by Border Force officers – would require staff to attend the workplace.
- Tom Burton
