In order to implement its programs and policies effectively and efficiently, a government needs an effective, efficient and responsive bureaucracy. An ineffective and inefficient as well as rigid, unresponsive and divided bureaucracy not only will vitiate program implementation, but also, in turn, create political trouble for the government. Therefore, it has become generally accepted that new governments had every right and concern to expect the bureaucracy to be cooperative rather than obstructive or apathetic. This expectation was implemented during the Hawke government.
The experiences of both the Whitlam and the Fraser governments had taught the Hawke government some important negative lessons about how relations with the Public Service should not be conducted. The Whitlam government had both distrusted and been distrusted by its bureaucrats. For its part, the bureaucracy was suspicious of the brash and expanded ministerial staff of the Whitlam ministers.
Moreover, the Whitlam government lacked policy co-ordination, and some senior bureaucrats did not necessarily follow the will of Cabinet or the will of the Prime Minister (Thomson 1989: 214). Some senior bureaucrats were appalled at the short cut style of administration of that Labor government. The morale of bureaucracy was very bad. The bureaucracy turned on the Whitlam government in ways great and small, including leaking to the media with extremely damaging results (Gruen and Grattan 1993: 40). During this government - as well as during the Fraser government - there was a mutual suspicion between ministers and the public service. Some Whitlam ministers, for instance, believed that elements in public service were deliberately attempting to sabotage the government (Thomson 1989: 216). During the Whitlam years, the public service had been presented as the “pacesetter” for the Prime Minister's vision. Under Fraser, the public service was seen as a parasite (Thomson 1989: 215).
The Hawke government recognised the necessity to avoid the mistakes that both Whitlam and Fraser had made, if it wanted a successful working relationship with the public service (Thompson 1989:219). Therefore, unlike its predecessors, the Hawke government viewed the bureaucracy in a more positive and less confrontationist way. For Hawke, the bureaucracy was seen as an instrument for achieving its over-riding goals: macro economic reform; deregulation of market forces; managerialism; an export re-orientation; debt reduction (Wiltshire 1990: 39), and (more importantly), burnishing its image as a competent, efficient , stable and unified government. Nevertheless, the Hawke government was also aware that to achieve this objective, it had to launch some reforms of the public service. Attempts to codify these were made long before the Hawke government was elected. When the Labor Party was in opposition, it had been acutely conscious of the need to prepare effectively for government, as can be seen in the paper entitled “Labor and the Quality of Government” (Gruen and Grattan 1993: 41).
The first wave of reforms to the Australian Public Service was made in June 1984 when the government passed the Public Service Act (1984). The aims of all
these reforms were to improve the responsiveness of the public service to governmental priorities, enhance its efficiency and increase its concern with issues of equality within it own workforce and in the delivery of government services (Thomson 1989: 221). To this end the government strengthened the power of the ministers over the public servants.
The abolition of what used to be called the “second division” and its replacement with a Senior Executive Service (SES), removing central personnel agency functions from the Public Service Board, granting Department secretaries virtual autonomy on organisational matters (provided they stayed within the frameworks set by the budget and positions classification guidelines established by the Public Service Commission) and consolidation of administrative appropriations into larger program votes, effectively enabling secretaries to transfer funds across the range of functional input, were just some the formal changes that the Hawke government made in its first term of office (Thomson 1989: 221).
The government also made other changes - greater openness in recruitment for senior executives; re-focused public service management attention on outputs rather than on process; and an innovative approach to organisational change, and in particular, a move towards less hierarchical structures. The government accepted the need for equality, fairness and representativeness in the public service. It also accepted and institutionalised the Ombudsman, Freedom of Information, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and the Administrative Review Tribunal. Finally, in order to change the norms of the bureaucracy and strengthen the career service's capacity for policy formulation and implementation, the government made a fundamental change through the creation of a senior executive service (Thomson
1989: 222).
In order to lessen the potential tension between ministerial staff and career bureaucrats, the Hawke government assimilated the former into the fabric of ministerial government. This proved a success. Creating a panel to screen the applications for ministerial staff positions ensured that the Prime Minister could
control appointments to some extent (at least in the first few years of government), and that unsuitable choices were discouraged (Thomson 1989: 223).
The reforms outlined in the Public Service Act 1984 endorsed an active role for the Public Service in Australia's future policy programs construction and delivery. Even more fundamentally, it was concerned to define efficiency, effectiveness and equality in terms of greater accountability, and to usher in an educated, innovative administration that was responsive to community needs and the establishment of fair and professional standards of management and employment (Public Service Board
1984:3-4; Dawkins 1984: 2151-8).
In 1986-87, the Hawke government once again reformed the Public Service. Unlike the previous reforms, however, the 1986-87 reforms were more reactive than reforming. The Hawke government's initial reforms were mainly aimed at reaffirming and strengthening ministerial responsibility and control. Through this, it hoped every department could meet its goals and objectives (Dawkin 1984: 61). The latter reforms emphasised the need to accommodate more effectively the notion of “managerialism” (Gruen and Grattan 1993: 43). These were a direct response to the economic crisis of mid 1986, the $ 1000 million blow-out in the budget deficit and Treasurer Keating's 'banana republic statements' (Thomson 1989: 224). Given the serious economic problems at the time, the government concluded that it had no choice but to cut back the public service and make it more efficient. Thus, according to Campbell and Halligan, under this framework, “there is a shift from administration to management, from a process orientation to a performance orientation and from central-agency control of transactions to managing for results” (Campbell and Halligan 1992: 165).
Some important reforms at this stage were that the government gave the Public Service Commission the power to transfer SES staff within the public service in the quest for efficient management of the Service. It also gave departmental secretaries more power to remove inefficient staff, and to switch monies between wages and other administration expenses. In addition, it abolished the right of appeal over
promotion of all, except junior, staff. The government created new redeployment and retirement procedures to facilitate the staff cuts. And finally, the government established an Efficiency Scrutiny Unit to systematically scrutinise public sector operations, and report directly to the Prime Minister (Thomson 1989: 225).
In 1987, the Hawke government restructured its Public Service yet again. Twenty six of the existing twenty-seven departments were changed into sixteen “mega departments”. It was argued that the government's objective in combining departments was that to gain a more rational use of limited resources ( Campbell and Halligan 1992: 180). It changed the ministry into a two-tier structure and amalgamated departments to achieve economies of scale by removing perceived competition, overlap and duplication. And finally the government abolished the Public Service Board, and gave its functions to individual departments and to a Public Service Commission (Thomson 1989: 227).
There is a general agreement that such a mega departments system has been productive (Gruen and Grattan 1993: 45). Codd (1990: 8-9) argued that these changes brought a range of benefits for the Hawke government. It enhanced ministerial control, produced better coordination and decision making processes, a broader perspective and greater scope of advice, and more coherence in policy advice and program development. It also allowed greater scope for delegation to portfolios, reduction in overlap and duplication, greater flexibility in operation and potential stability in machinery of government. The amalgamation of Foreign Affairs and Trade is one of the examples of this claim. Such a new structure has given a more practical edge to the needs of Australia in facing the problem of internationalising its economy.
In sum, despite some criticism that it had politicised the public service, the Hawke government largely achieved its aim of establishing an effective, efficient and harmonious working relationship with the bureaucracy. The government established strong political control over the bureaucracy (Campbell and Halligan 1992: 204). This, as a result, has contributed to the achievement of administrative
efficiency and improvement in budget processes, and enhanced policy co-ordination (Thomson 1989: 227). Contrasting the Hawke government with the previous governments, Campbell and Halligan noted that the Hawke government ministers had more control over the APS than had their predecessors. In their view, “the bureaucrats under the previous governments really were making recommendations and policy suggestions, but with this government that’s not so... the ministers tell you what they want” ( Campbell and Halligan 1992: 204). This means the policy capacity of the ministerial office was stronger than before, and there was a reduction in the capacity of senior bureaucrats to exert an improper degree of influence upon government policy. The political directions emanated from the political executive and the minister's office, not from the department. “Far from bureaucrats dominating the scene and stage... the ascendancy has been really well and truly in the political corner” (Campbell and Halligan 1992: 204).
This argument of Campbell and Halligan has been supported by Pusey. In his research Pusey found that a considerable majority of senior executive service (SES) officers he interviewed had a great respect for the competence of the Hawke government. Although senior public servants often resented the “politicisation” of particular issues and problems, they nonetheless welcomed strong ministerial leadership. They believed that strong ministers and an effective, strongly-led and united cabinet were the indispensable first conditions of good government. Poor leadership, in contrast, was seen as the factor that most threatened the consistency and coherence of policy and management; strong control was judged the best bulwark against such problems (Pusey 1991: 66-67). It was in this respect that the Hawke government has been judged positively not just by the bureaucracy but by the Australian electorate as a whole.