APS faces a tough balancing act in writing Blue and Red Books during 2022 federal election period

"Prudently I had gone to bed before many of the others. ... Imagine the scene, the reek of alcohol fumes, the sight of people - some of them looking the worse for wear - scouring the ground picking up all the glass [from a broken beer stubby]. Into this chaos walked a senior public servant making a special delivery to me," she writes.

"During an election campaign, the public service prepares comprehensive incoming government briefs for both sides of politics. It is the first advice to you on how to go about implementing your election policies and the likely hurdles you will face as a government. Called the Red Books, for the first period of government these are your bible."

Right now, as an election date firms up, the Australian Public Service will be gearing up to prepare these blue (for the Coalition) and red (ALP) incoming government briefing "bibles".

Senior public servants are already being publicly urged to be bold in their IGBs, but how much will they be prepared to risk being seen as too "out there", or worse, as offering a "bureaucrat's agenda" to a new or returned government? Understandable though a cautious approach may be, it would serve neither the nation nor the new government well. In an era of policy stagnation, we can only hope that bold and deep thinking will be reflected in the IGBs - red or blue - as we all gear up for our democracy sausages in the next few months.

Few outside the public service understand the challenges for the nation's bureaucrats once Prime Minister Scott Morrison makes his trip to Government House. Finance and Treasury will shoulder the load on the financial side. They have already published an updated guide on costing election policies of the contending parties. They will also release a Preelection Economic and Fiscal Outlook report within 10 days of the election writs being issued. The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet has updated its Guidance on Caretaker Conventions and during caretaker will field myriad questions from departments about major or sensitive decisions, contracts or appointments. The Parliamentary Budget Office will also be busy, as MPs ask for costings of election commitments.

But the most interesting work in the lead-up to an election is much less public: writing the two IGBs. This is the cardinal opportunity for senior executives to dig into the next (i.e. new or returned) government's language, ideological preferences and key priorities, beginning of course with their election commitments. Departments will already be tracking announcements by the major parties, such as Labor's $500 million to start work on a fast rail link between Sydney and the Hunter. Departments will also have valuable "inside information" on the government's considerable "decisions taken but not announced" election "war chest".

Portfolios will approach their IGBs with different roles and traditions. PM&C and the Australian Public Service Commission will be alert to pronouncements about the APS and machinery of government changes, such as how the ALP would approach senior appointments including rolling back the increasing "militarisation" and the perceived politicisation of the public service. Treasury will likely be doing some "blue-sky thinking" or "war gaming", given the uncertain global environment and year three of a pandemic "mega crisis". Defence will be getting ready to field detailed questions about AUKUS and major procurements and contracts. The Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment will be very alert to parties' pronouncements on climate change and environmental degradation, given both generate such political heat.

Other "line" departments will be preparing briefs on election promises, stakeholder views, winners and losers under different policy options, timeframes, resourcing, legislative priorities and the like. They will focus on managing the avalanche of information that will confront new ministers, with a schedule of actions and decisions to be taken in the first day, week, month, and year of office. IGBs are not merely abstract thought pieces: they provide a roadmap to help new ministers learn fast on the job.

Being multipurpose documents, IGBs are a difficult juggling act for APS leaders. New ministers will be preoccupied with the election commitments for which the prime minister will hold them responsible. Departments must therefore demonstrate a close understanding of the policy design and implementation issues, to earn trust and build a good working relationship. Getting the balance right between risks and opportunities and mixing necessary detail with snappy summaries will call on the art as well as the craft of public administration.

But the "bible" needs to offer more than a response to a minister's "top-of-screen" concerns. IGBs should also be bold, seeding conversations about the tough, sometimes intractable, and longer-term challenges the minister will face. We all would have our own lists. What departments need to decide is: What's on their list? For example, increasing inequality (in 2017-18 the wealth of the highest 20 per cent was over 90 times that of the lowest 20 per cent, a situation the pandemic will have exacerbated) and the power imbalances this creates, may well become prominent in the coming parliamentary term. Given the consequences for economic and social policy, this "wicked" problem should be on the list of all departments with social or economic policy responsibilities.

In some cases, there will be public "hooks" for these bigger conversations. For example, Labor treasury spokesman Jim Chalmers has signalled the ALP's focus on "quality spending" and measuring progress and wellbeing, over expenditure restraint in the budget. On the challenge of regulating digital currencies, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has indicated the Coalition's ambition for Australia to be a world leader.

In 2022, getting IGBs right is both tougher and more important than usual. The APS has earned both praise and criticism for its work on the pandemic. Executive appetite for in-depth analysis of controversial issues may be limited, given the "COVID battering" many departments have experienced. Efficiency dividends, arbitrary staffing caps, and the power shift to ministerial offices all contribute to a less than expansive mood in the APS's senior echelons. Ministers tending to value stakeholder and consultant advice over - or even instead of - departments' policy insights has also undermined confidence.

Nonetheless, the caretaker period provides the opportunity for public servants to be engaged in conversations that seldom occur otherwise. They get to flex their "agency" muscles - something we've previously discussed - by engaging in internal analysis and robust debate of the policy conundrums in their policy space, perhaps with "starter" pieces prepared by their strategic coordination or research areas. It is a time when executives are more likely to have the head space to engage in more expansive conversations.

Bringing a flavour of these discussions into IGBs is undoubtedly tricky. As policy stewards, secretaries are obliged to brief incoming governments on the challenges and opportunities beyond the three-year term of government and more broadly than the governing party's election commitments. Briefing on these deeper and longer-term issues can demonstrate to ministers the departmental policy capability at their disposal and sow important seeds for later conversations. But new or returning governments that are strongly focused on election commitments, such as Scott Morrison's 2019 government, may be impatient or even resent this as "manipulation". Secretaries may play it safe with a brief, anodyne scene-setting section, with the bulk about election commitments plus the details of the portfolio, legislation, and the like (see the 116 publicly available pages of excruciating detail in the Department of Health's 2019 IGB).

Secretaries and their departments are gearing up right now for their IGB Red and Blue Books. We all depend on them figuring out how to meet the returned or new government's demands while bringing fresh ideas to the table.