Millie Rooney | Public Sector Informant: getting the public service in the public good conversation

And yet just recently I found myself among a group of very senior (current and ex) public servants utterly impressed, and just a little bit surprised, by their experiences and perspectives. In recent years I've spent a lot of time talking with Australians about the idea of the public good and asking what people want for themselves and their communities and who should provide it. And while I heard a lot about the role of government - particularly politicians - the absence of any real reference to the public service was notable.

Given that the federal government has signalled its intent to focus on APS reform, now feels like a good time to be having public conversations about the role of the public service in providing the public good.

Thanks to the support of UNSW Canberra and some fantastic public policy scholars and retired public servants, I found myself in a room full of experts ready and keen to start this dialogue.

There is inspiration to be had in the humility of people genuinely wanting to do their bit as a mostly invisible part of a system that, when working, is designed to support society.

While one participant quipped that "the public service has really lost its mojo" and there was a definite sense that there are significant problems within the system, it was also clear that many of the individuals are as committed and passionate as ever.

Here are some of my initial reflections as a fly on the wall.

I was still surprised by one participant's reflection on the way expectations about the role of government and the public service change over time. They said: "We've switched from that post-war understanding that as government you provide people with basic support and then let them get on with their lives, but that you support them when they fall down. Now the expectation seems to be 'we will make things better'".

These increased expectations arguably come at a time when public service resourcing is relatively low and where there is a sense of disconnect between the services provided by the government and the people they are intended to serve and a lack of clarity about the different roles of government and private sector.

An important question then becomes "who decides what the public good is, and which values and agendas get to shape what is seen as useful public policy?"

A veteran of the public service suggested that as a country we share a lot of values and ideas about what we should prioritise as a society, we also need to recognise that we are a democracy and so sometimes good process leads to outcomes we individually might not like (or as he phrased it "democracy is a washing machine and sometimes things don't come out the way you want them to").

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While it was clear to the group around the table that values-based frames drive all public servants, they agreed it is rare for these frames to be explicitly discussed. As one person said, "all these frameworks you just absorb and think they are common sense until they are not". Because public servants tend to shy away from discussing the values underpinning what they do, there can be a lack of questioning of the logic of even quite major policy propositions.

It was mind-boggling to me to realise there is so little space for explicit conversation within the public service about the values, politics and purpose underpinning policy.

There are multiple reasons for this, which one of the participants clearly articulated to me after the event. "One, national culture - we don't do deep conversations much in Australia. Two, Australian public servants generally prioritise action. And three, public servants are highly sensitive to their responsibilities as apolitical officials who, at the end of the day, must be responsive to the democratically elected government, so discussions of values feel a bit redundant.

The problem is, we all have values, whether we talk about them or not, and if we don't talk about them, how can we develop a deep, effective culture of service?"

What was heartening to me (as someone who really values process and the airing of hidden values, agendas and purpose), was that most participants were strongly in favour of making time and space for process - to enable these conversations around values to take place. Noting Hannah Arendt's work on politics in the public space, someone said, "It is important that we [the public service] have political discussion. Not 'capital P' politics but, of course policymaking is a highly political space. We need to actively engage in these discussions. It shouldn't be a comfortable process, but we've got to have it."

Often public servants are required to think about the financial efficiency of any given policy, a perspective strongly influenced by neoclassical economic ideas. Public policy these days attempts to be scientific and values free, - but is ironically driven by market ideology and mechanisms. We measure policies by GDP growth and productivity, and use this economic framework to draw boundaries between productive and unproductive activities. One participant noted it took a Productivity Commission review to argue that the NDIS would have a positive economic outcome before it was accepted, "when shouldn't we be implementing the NDIS because it is a genuinely good thing to do for people and society?". (This is something we think a lot about at Australia reMADE - just because it grows the economy or GDP doesn't mean it serves the public good!).

Another attendee reflected, "There are so many documents across the Commonwealth public service talking about efficiency and effectiveness. But it shouldn't be the cheapest policy that wins; it should be about what delivers the best outcomes." More than anything, at the end of the meeting I felt a sense of immense possibility, in part because I think so much of the work has already been done. We do have a public service full of committed servants wanting to serve well.

And we do have a broader public who, despite low levels of trust in the ability of government to do the right thing for the Australian people are actually quite eager to genuinely contribute to how this country operates - both locally and nationally. While there are significant structural changes to be made, there are also many gains to be had by speaking loudly and proudly about the role of public servants.

In the final round of comments for the day, there was a rousing cry to find the courage and the capacity for public servants to start, as one person put it, "Talking about things that are really important in national life, in vivid big ideas language!" This cry certainly resonates with my own work and the hunger we've seen for talking about national purpose, vision and ideas in ways that lead to real changes to community life.

Bureaucracy may have become a dirty word, but the world of public service really can and does, at its best, serve the people.

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