Quote of the week
“A new employment model is not so much a choice as a necessity.”
— Prime Minister’s Advisory Committee on the Public Service
Editor’s Corner
While the gist of the 7th annual report of the Prime Minister’s Advisory Committee on the Public Service focuses on the need to change the public service employment model, its comments on service delivery and innovation are also important.
On service delivery, the report notes that there would appear to be agreement from the deputy head level down that there is a “concern over red tape and innovation, and a common desire to take more responsible risks.”
In addition to this, the report says that “the biggest obstacles to constructive change in the public service are the excessive controls, reporting requirements and limitations on authority that prevent managers from focusing on excellence….”
The main message here is that “more must be done” to make change happen.
The report doesn’t explain why things are not moving as fast as they should. It would seem that if just about everyone agrees there is too much red tape, excessive controls, too many reporting requirements and too little innovation, then things would change. Yet the report indicates they are not.
The report gives no reasons as to why. The subject is dropped as the last section (Conclusions and Recommendations) focuses entirely on the new employment model.
Could it be that the rest of the report is subtly telling the Prime Minister that it is not the public service that is the problem and that the politicians need to ease up on risk and remove some of the “excessive controls” they have imposed on it?
