Taking the long term view in policymaking

I spent last week at Sydney's Graduate School of Government. It's run by Geoff Gallop who is the ex-Premier of Western Australia and good friend of Tony Blair's since their college days together. Geoff was kind enough to invite me to Sydney as a visting fellow and guest lecturer at the University.

I gave a number of talks on strategy and policymaking, as well as an evening address on long-termism in government (rather embarassingly to most of the public service's top brass from past and present). It'll be podcasted soon, but otherwise available here.

My argumentation was that we should broaden the concept of long-termism; and that governments are typically poor at planning for the long-term, but increasingly need to get better at it, and can do so through:

1. Creating spaces for long-term thinking in the architecture of government, with examples of the Strategy Unit, Foresight and so on
2. Using independent reviews and more independent analysis to create public value and consensus on long-term issues, such as through the Nick Stern Review of the Economics of Climate Change
3. Designing systems, rules and incentives for long-termism through reform to national accounting rules and performance management approaches
4. Developing a culture and practice of long-termism in the public service workforce
5. Aligning strategic policy analysis to a level most appropriate to taking the long-term view

Interestingly, in so far as these are the right components, I think the UK is ahead of other countries. In discussion I also tried to emphasise that different combinations of these will be approporate in different circumstances. So, for example, simple accounting rules is unlikely to be much use in addressing the long-term threat of climate change, but the public value approach through honest and open debate might be more so.

The 'Ekka'

Today is a public holiday for Queensland’s ‘Ekka’ festival. Its official name is the Royal Queensland Show, though like many Australian words was shortened to ‘Ekka’ from its original title, the ‘Queensland Intercolonial Exhibition’, which dated back to 1876.

It’s principally an agricultural show and was, and to some extent remains, an opportunity to demonstrate new technologies and inventions. Lasting a week and held on Brisbane’s showgrounds, it’s the annual chance for many Queenslanders to visit the ‘big smoke’, many of whom will travel distances over 2,000km to get here (and that’s just within the state).

I went along last night and it was quite an experience (and good fun). It was full of people donning cowboy hats, sheepskin jackets and leather boots. Entertainment included rodeo, wood chopping, monster truck driving, various agricultural prize shows, and a laser and fireworks show sponsored by the Dairy Farmers union. Not much more to add really, but thought as it's such an iconic Queensland event I couldn’t not add something on it.

An argument for consumption taxes

Australia’s Treasury has recently kicked off a fundamental review of the tax and transfer system, with publication of a discussion paper and creation of a review panel.

It’s got a pretty immense scope. On the tax side, Australia’s three big taxes are - like most OECD countries - income tax, corporation tax and consumption tax (in that order). Together these make up about 85% of total revenue, with a further 122 taxes making up the rest.

For my part I’ve long thought the left needs to get over its fear of consumption taxes and shift this up the revenue hierarchy. Why?

Here’s a quick list of 10 for starters…

1. Easy to administer: unlike many other taxes a consumption tax doesn’t need such a level of bureaucracy and administration to run.
   


2. Hard for the rich to avoid: let’s face it – it’s pretty easy to avoid many taxes if you’re wealthy enough to pay for a decent accountant or smart enough to know how to shift money into different forms or between different countries. Consumption – paid at source – is almost impossible to avoid.
   


3. Consumption is a better tracker of long-term income: while incomes used to be relatively stable over the life course, today many people’s incomes will fluctuate considerably (e.g. as people take career breaks or move between different sectors). Taxing consumption is actually a lot fairer way to pay your share over the long term.
   


4. Earned income less correlated with wealth than consumption: again, while in the past earned income formed a sizable proportion of total wealth, today unearned income (like from share investment) rising and difficult to tax. So income tax becoming relatively unfairly burdenous on middle and low-middle income earners. Consumption more closely linked to total income.
   


5. Income and corporation taxes are not the tax bases that they once were: Income tax is less useful these days as unearned income rises in proportion of wealth. In any case income taxes always a drag on productivity through their labour supply effect. And there’s strong downward pressure on corporation taxes in a global economy. Meanwhile the revenue side needs to come from somewhere.
   


6. Link between consumption and happiness weak: the line from classical economists has always been that people know best how to spend their money. I’d broadly agree but at the margins the evidence looking clearer that that marginal DVD really doesn’t matter that much to us anymore.
   


7. We need to save more anyway: Anglo-Saxon economies have long been over-consuming and under-saving. Indeed I’d argue that’s one of the causal factors driving the current downturn. A marginal shift to consumption taxes will raise the savings rate.
   


8. Possible to exempt goods for social objectives: the left always been afraid of effect of consumption taxes on the poor. But easy to exempt for things like babies clothes (which we do already).
   


9. And vice versa on ‘sins’: good evidence that price (as part of a wider package of behaviour drivers) can reduce unhealthy smoking and drinking.
   


10. There are other economic benefits to consumption taxes like their neutrality on differential investments (unlike corporation and income taxes).

Australian Politicians (5): Troy Buswell

Australian politicians come in many moulds. Most are very entertaining. So it is today with regret that Australia bids farewell to Western Australia Leader of the Opposition, Troy Buswell.

Not quite at the same bizarre level of fetishism as former British politician Mark Oaten*, but certainly a record of survival that would make Peter Mandelson proud, Troy has over his year career in politics…

• Been caught out several times as a ‘seat sniffer’ of chairs vacated by female aides. On one occasion Troy apparently ‘groaned and writhed in sexual pleasure after lifting a chair above his head and sniffing the seat deeply’
  
  
• Pulled bra-snapping tricks on Labor party staffers
  
  
• ‘Squirrel-gripped’ (i.e. grabbed the testicles of) a fellow Member of Parliament.

Anyhow Troy today decided to quit politics to move 'onwards and upwards' in life. I supposed it'd be hard to go much lower...

(* if you've forgotten the exact reason why Mark Oaten resigned, a googling of 'shit', 'face', 'rent-boy', and 'eat' should assist)

Making the news in Queensland ...

Two Queensland news stories have dominated for over a month now. Together I think they show how difficult it is running a government in today’s media world. The first is about a sex offender, Dennis Ferguson. A repeat offender, Ferguson was released in July after the judge decided he wouldn’t receive a fair trial for his latest offense. Since then he’s spent the last month being hounded by the media and public from one safe house to another.

The second story is about a surgeon nicknamed “Dr Death” who is accused of gross incompetence while practicing in Queensland. Jayant Patel arrived in Australia several years ago, seemingly after various counts of professional misconduct in America. Employed without full checks, Patel was subsequently linked with the deaths of up to 87 patients. Fleeing back to America he was extradited back a few weeks ago and is awaiting trial. Again, there’s a good chance it’ll be thrown out because he won’t get a fair trial.

Both these stories have severely damaged the Government’s reputation in recent weeks, with them unable to gain any control. They are the sort of things that hit governments from time to time; I guess Queensland has been particularly unlucky to have both running together.

What to do? Like most others I’m pretty stumped...

• Distract with other announcements? Hard to see what would sufficiently grab the attention and in any case risks being accused of doing such would hardly win favours.
  


• Tackle head on? Difficult to see what government can actually do in these sort of situations. Any sign of interference with due process and they’ll surely get slapped down by the judiciary.
  


• Put your hands up and admit there’s nothing to be done? Yes, but the man on the street demands that something must be done.
  


• Tough it out with hard rhetoric and little action? Hmmm, maybe that’s the one.

Australian politicians (4): Bob Brown

An Australian hero of tree-huggers world-over, bête noire of tycoon and industrialist, this week's Australian politician is none other than Senator and Leader of the Australian Greens, Bob Brown. To say he represents minorities would be something of an understatement:

• He represents the State of Tasmania, a small and largely irrelevant power when sitting around the negotiating table with the likes of New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland
  
• He leads the Australia Greens, which in a country blessed with some of world's richest abundance of natural resources is always going to be a bit like pissing in the wind
  
• He was also the first openly gay member of the Australian Parliament, again probably not something to naturally endear him to a nature of rugged, beer swilling Australian males

Anyhow, Bob Brown has a CV brimming with campaigning experience. Arrested nine times, he actually spent 16 days in jail following a famous, and ultimately successful, campaign to block the damming of the Franklin River. Bob’s anti-logging efforts managed to get him shot at and his car burned; his interruption of President George Bush’s Parliamentary address in 2003 earned him a suspension from the institution (ironically, it was a speech on the importance of Free Speech that he interrupted and was barred for).

Importantly, it turns out that Bob Brown’s Greens may now hold the key to Rudd pushing through Labor’s emission trading scheme. That’s come about because the Opposition Coalition are looking likely to withdraw their support – requiring Labor to turn to the Greens as the party holding the power balance in the Senate.

Will make for a very interesting few months, with the hysterics over petrol prices pushing for a watered down scheme negotiated with the Opposition. The politically smart move from the Greens would clearly be to head this off and move early and with open arms to Labor (and take a hit on some of the purity of things). Something that fortunately doesn’t seem to have escaped Senator Bob Brown.

New cultures

At the weekend I went along to 'Queensland Roars Against Racism'. First on the bill was a celebrity football game followed by a match between the Brazilian team, Palmeiras, and Queensland's professional team, 'Roar'. The tickets were courtesy of local author, Nick Earls, who was playing in the celebrity game and is a friend of a friend.

Two observations from that night. First, that disappointingly football isn't really a world game after all. On a number of occasions the various celebrities - including players of aussie rules and rugby, TV stars, and musicians - had to be explained the basic rules of football like which part of the pitch you're allowed to stand in during kick off and how to do a throw in. And I'm not even allowed to call it 'football'.


Second, that there's a whole popular cultural history in Australia that I've never come across. Of course each country has its own cultural stock of people and events. But what's slowly dawned on me is that I know almost nothing about the popular cultural history of this place -- save for perhaps the Minogues, Germaine Greer, Clive James, Harry Kewell, Nicole Kidman, and the present and past cast of Neighbours.

Indeed I can only ever remember hearing about three news stories relating to Australia in my entire life (which were the American scuba divers left behind by their boat and presumably eaten by sharks, the beauty therapist jailed in Indonesia for drug carrying and causing outcry across Australia, and the Cape York rape case).

Before arriving here I wouldn't have been able to name (certainly without prompting) a single band, author, painter, playwriter, politician, film maker or actor actually living and working in Australia.


Just as an example of things over the last week alone, is it just me that has never heard of the chart topping band Powderfinger, the motor racing 'legend' Peter Brock, the classic comedy film The Castle, the eclectic and popular painter Sidney Nolan, and for that matter the bestselling author Nick Earls??

Aussie beers (2)

Was about to do another blog on Aussie beers and then came across this news story. Darwin resident Michael Leary was spending $1,100 a week on beer, supposedly equivalent to 27 'slabs' per week. (A slab is a case of 24 beers, so that would be over 600 beers a week. Clearly something wrong with the maths here, probably a bit of exageration and him drinking at bars rather than by 4-caseload at home every night. Still, impresive.)

The absolute best bit, however, is the quote from the magistrate:

''(That is) poor judgement on two counts there - drinking that much and drinking Melbourne Bitter''.

I'll try to source some for review in the next beer blog...

Federalism

One thing I hadn’t quite anticipated before coming to Queensland is the depth of wrangling between State and Commonwealth governments. I perhaps also thought that even if things have been tense at other times, it’d be much smoother with Labor governments now in power at all levels. Not so.

The heart of the issue is at which level should sit various policy responsibilities. For example, on health policy the Commonwealth pay for GPs and primary care, the States for community care and public health with consequential challenges particularly around coorindation, funding, and accountability. In the debate about what sits where I find myself increasingly siding with the Commonwealth.

It’s again a hot topic following an impassioned speech by Queensland’s Premier Anna Bligh billed as a ‘spirited defence of federalism’. It’s definitely worth a read, even though it contained some bad along with the good.

The Bad

• A good use of the ‘subsidiarity principle’ (i.e. that power should sit at the most local level possible) but needs more detail on the underlying rationale. I also believe in subsidiarity though could equally use it to construct an argument for aggregation e.g. with the various tests I previously posted. And, perhaps ironically, other advocates of subsidiarity might note it’s a strong argument for devolving power to local agencies and bypass states altogether.
  
  
• A number of dodgy factual claims. The worst offender of which is the statement that ‘Federated structures like Australia … have higher rates of per capita GDP’. (Note this isn’t a claim that one causes the other, but it’s certainly intended to imply that.) I read the research report on which this was based on and what the analysis used is a simple comparison of average per capita GDP in federal countries (i.e. US, Switzerland, Australia) compared to unitary systems (i.e. UK, France etc). Pretty ridiculous really.
  
  
• Some select interpretations on global trends. For example, Bligh says ‘let’s acknowledge the global trend towards federalism’. No, let’s not. What seems to be happening is a slow but steady trend for more complex, multi-faceted and tiered governance arrangements but not really in what could be called federalist in the sense of multiple layers within the same political system. For example, aggregating some functions up to higher levels like the EU and major international institutions, devolving others down.
  
  

The Good

• The concept of exchange of responsibilities. A bargaining between State and Commonwealth levels about which responsibilities should sit where will help ensure the process is thoughtful rather than a simple power-grab.
  
  
• Application to education, health, and climate change. It makes the debate real and has put some issues on the table for debate.
  
  
• Excellent timing and thoughtful contribution to the debate that’s put Queensland in a lead position in negotiations over the next 6 months or so.

Australian Politicians (3): Bob Hawke

The latest distinctively Australian politician I’ve discovered is a former Prime Minister by the name of Bob Hawke. The Labour PM between 1983 and 1991, he was eventually usurped from within by Paul Keating.

His major policy achievements included:

• Some substantial economic reform included financial deregulation, dismantling of trade tariffs, and floating of the Australian dollar
  
  
• Establishing Australia’s Medicare system of social insurance (or rather re-establishing under a different name the ‘Medibank’ system abolished by the Liberals)
  
  
• Some early moves on Aboriginal affairs
  

Trumping all of these however was a much earlier achievement of Hawke’s while at University. It turns out he held a Guinness World Record no less for being the world’s fastest beer consumer, gulping down a yard of ale in 11 seconds.

Hawke later claimed this enviable boozing feat was the single most important factor in contributing to his later political success, endearing him forever to a nation of beer lovers.

Only in Australia…

Industrial policy in the Gold Coast

I spent the weekend travelling along and around the 'Gold Coast' to the south of Brisbane. The 60km coast receives over four million visitors per year, to see not just the great beaches but also the whole host of tourist attractions such as the Florida style Warner Bros Movie World and Sea World theme parks.

Perhaps the most famous part is a resort known today as 'Surfers Paradise'. It's a glizy and glam place, with the skyline lit up by a multitude of casinos, shopping malls and nightclubs. But it wasn't always like this. Indeed the town formerly known as Elston was still a very rural, remote and largely unvisited town as late as the 1950s.

So what's the secret to transforming a small and insigificant seaside town into one of Australia's major tourist hubs? Targeted capital tax breaks? Relaxed planning laws? Investment in infrastructure?

Apparently not. Instead it was down to the ingenuity of local entrepreneur Bernie Elsey who, in 1965, decided to employ 'meter maids' in gold lamé bikinis to feed the parking meters along the strip. People soon flocked to Surfers Paradise where, rather than have militant parking wardens dole out fines, they would find glamous young girls to feed their meter for them and, if they returned late, leave a calling card for them to pay later.

The region has never looked back. (Actually part of the explanation was also the building of road and rail links, a couple of risky but eventually profitable high rise developments and massive investment in marketing campaigns, though that all sounds a bit too boring).

Anna Bligh and Political Personalities

Having a mind that unfortunately only starts working when there’s something to analyse or contrast I tend to think of politicians falling into various shapes and guises. For example:

• The ‘Fire-fighter’: the type of politician who only gets energy when dealing with crises, or when thrown into some bitter public dispute. This animal thrives on confrontation and quarrel and is a master of political tricks and deception. John Reid and David Blunkett come to mind.
  
  
• The ‘Implementer’: the silent and unassuming type of politician who quietly gets on with implementing the commands of those more senior, building a reputation for robust but unimaginative delivery. Which makes a good basis for slow but steady progression through the ranks – Alastair Darling’s a perfect example.
  
  
• The ‘Big-tenter’: the politician who strives to canvass a wide range of views and build consensus. Tends to be viewed as nice but indecisive, and probably not destined for the big portfolios. Hillary Benn perhaps?
  
  
• The ‘Party loyalist’: the politician who likes to be seen as the one with their ear closest to the party’s grassroots and a champion of the views of the man in the street. Likely to play a key bridging role between policy and party (and the accompanying baggage) and be a solid and immovable character. John Prescott played this role for almost two decades.
  
  
• The ‘Planter-shaper’: the big-picture ideas and problem-solving type of politician who develops a reputation for having the most creative and unorthodox ideas. This is a high-risk, high-return strategy and the fastest route to the top if played well. The two Millibands and Purnell are probably the best current UK examples.
  
  
• The ‘Investigator-Evaluator’: the scrutinising type of politician, always with a keen eye on finding new ways of operating. An analytical animal by nature, the investigator-evaluator politician scans for best-practice though perhaps with a view more to improving existing policy practices than the more fundamental ‘questioning the question’ type strategy role.
  
  
• The ‘Specialist’: a rare breed of politician, one who is a technical expert in their field and has generally has high levels of professional credibility. Lord Darzi perhaps falls in this category; Ivan Lewis has been cultivating a similar reputation in social care over recent years.
  
  
• The ‘Controller-dictator’: one of the worst types of politicians whose lust for power can result in controlling tendencies, monitoring all they command and control. Unfortunately, and most tragically, this can sometimes be without a reason why.
  

I’ve seen Queensland’s Premier Anna Bligh in action a few times now and I must say she’s an impressive politician. Probably a combination of the 'investigator-evaluator', 'big-tenter' and 'implementer' it’s driving a real cultural shift in the public service here towards more serious long term policy and planning. By all accounts this is in marked contrast to the previous – and successful – Premier, Peter Beattie, who I’m told fell more into the ‘fire-fighter’ camp.

Brown vs Rudd

Last week Gordon Brown marked his first year anniversary as Prime Minister. Over here Kevin Rudd is hot on his heels, coming up to seven months at the helm.

So how do these two stack up? When Gordon got a kicking in May’s local elections he said his premiership would be about a renewed focus on ‘listening and leading’.

What does listening and leading mean in this context? I’d suggest:

• Listen: have an ear for subtle shifts in the public mood, weave together competing viewpoints into your narrative, distinguish the genuine from the loudest


• Lead: set a clear direction, make tough choices, inspire party and public
  

But these aren’t the only character traits required for the job. A few others…

• Learn: okay so being PM is not an apprenticeship, but nonetheless all jobs require learning over time and this one’s no different. So if personality, policy, or presentation isn’t working a good PM has capacity to learn from mistakes, adapt and move on.
  
  
• Likable: it’d be a bad PM that pandered for day-to-day popularity. But being likable can take many forms. At his best Blair was likeable for his charisma; Sarkoszy at the start at the start at least for his boldness; Clinton for his sheer brilliance.
  
  
• Be Lucky: in its purest form luck is obviously not something within a PM’s command. But some people make their own luck. More probably some PMs are such masters of strategy that it looks to all others as though fortune is always on their side.


• Be ready to ‘Let go’: the job is huge, there are a near infinite number of issues to get involved in and multiple tiers of detail. Even workaholics can’t manage it all. It’s key to be know when, where and on what to let go and hand down to others.
  

Listen. I’d score Brown 2/5; Rudd 4/5.

(Brown’s talked a lot about ‘listening’ over the last year – whether to the Cabinet, to the Labour party, to Parliament, to the public. There’s little evidence of this actually happening though. After all when did you last see Gordon in front of a studio audience? Rudd on the other hand has made some real attempts to more systematically listen to the Australian public. For example, there’s been a blitz through a national ‘2020’ policy forum, regular community cabinets across the country and televised PM ‘question time’ formats on TV.)

Lead. Brown 2/5; Rudd 4/5

(Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of Brown’s period as PM. So much was expected from him to be the grand strategist and lead Labour into a new phase. There was probably a deal of misattribution of leadership in those early summer months of plague, fire and pestilence. It’s not completely fallen away though; he at least retains command over party and Cabinet. Rudd meanwhile has steered a very straight policy course and held his nerve to date when required e.g. on carbon trading)

Learn. Brown 2/5; Rudd 4/5

(Probably a bit too soon to say on Rudd. Though given he and most of his Cabinet are new to Government one has to be impressed with their capacity to quickly adapt to modern government. There’s little evidence of Brown learn to adapt either package or presentation.)

Likable. Brown: 1/5; Rudd 5/5.

(Many PM’s have vocal groups who intensely dis-like them, and Brown and Rudd are not alone in this. What’s probably unique in Brown is that it’s incredibly hard to find anyone who now actively likes him. At best he seems to manage grudging respect. Rudd meanwhile retains a 48 point lead as preferred PM and is widely liked.)

Lucky. Brown 2/5; Rudd 3/5.

(Both seem to have an uncanny knack of getting messages slightly wrong, timings imperfect. For example Rudd’s unfortunate words on the public service and leak over petrol price policy watching represented some poor judgment but also some unfortunate combination of events and news cycles to take maximum effect.)

Let go. Brown 1/5; Rudd 1/5.

(Together they are probably the most controlling and workaholic politicians in recent history. Rudd is still known as ‘Dr Death’ or the ‘bean counter’ in the Queensland public service for the excessive demands he placed; the ‘Stalinist’ Brown is meanwhile famous for his 4 am starts, hands-on approach and inability to devolve to others.)

Overall scores: Brown 10/30. Rudd 21/30.

Result: Yet another head-to-head victory for the Aussies. Time for unconstitutional take-over?

'Queenslander' buildings

Hiring a car today I headed west to explore some rural areas of Queensland. The roads were dusty and quiet, the radio waves filled with Banjo players extolling the virtues of a God fearing existence.

But I came across a couple of gems. One was an excellent train museum in a industrial town called Ipswich. As many good museums do, it manages to mix its theme with some well researched and presented social history.

The other was some great examples of the 'Queenslander' architectural style. Most of these were built in the mid to late 19th century, with the notable features being the large verandahs, timber builds (often raised on stumps), and plenty of windows and doors to ventilate.

As the photos show they make for really attractive buidings; the 'Architecture of Happiness' guru, Alain de Botton, would be pleased with them I'm sure.

What's in a name?

Something that’s really struck me since arriving in Australia, and which Bill Bryson also notes in his excellent Down Under book, are the small number of incredibly commonplace names.

To make the point, there is, for example, a Macquarie Harbour, Macquarie Island, Macquarie Marsh, Macquarie River, Macquarie Fields, Macquarie Pass, Macquarie Plains, Macquarie Lake, Port Macquarie, Mrs Maquarie’s Chair, Macquarie Point, and a Macquarie town. Not content with this, there’s also a Macquarie bank, a Macquarie University, a national ‘Macquarie’ dictionary, a Macquarie shopping centre, Macquarie Lighthouse, Macquarie Park and Macquarie Hospital, not to mention a main ‘Macquarie’ street running through central Sydney.

There’s then a Darling Harbour, Darling Drive, Darling Island, Darling Point, Darlinghust, Darlington, Darling Downs and Darling Ranges, a slew of Daringtons and a River Darling. Apparently, what isn’t called Darling or Macquarie is often called Hunter or Murray. Awfully confusing.

Making matters worse there are also a lot of places named Sturt or Stuart such as the Sturt and Stuart Highways, both of which leave Adelaide, one of which takes you to Sydney, the other 3,994 kilometers off to Darwin. Clearly would be a tad costly mistake to miss the ‘a’ when you are shooting around the ring road.

So who were these people who so successfully managed to implant their family name all over an entire continent?

Perhaps unsurprisingly it turns out they all had what might be termed a well defined sense of self. Some were more deserving than others to have the legacy.

• Lachan Macquarie was one of the first colonial administrators of Australia (indeed it was he who first used the term ‘Australia’ in official documents) and seems to have had some relatively progressive ideas like re-integrating convicts back into positions in society.
  


• Ralph Darling on the other hand appears to have been guilty of both that common mix of egoism and tyranny, for example insisting prisoners “worked in irons that the example may deter others from the commission of crime” and reportedly many other torturing to death.


• Sturt and Stuart were both Australian explorers of the 19th Century; the former who made the first pioneering explorations inland from Botany Bay, the latter who was the first to traverse the continent from south to north.

Death of the 20th Century model of public service

One of the major issues facing the Queensland Government is recruiting and retaining a highly productive and motivated workforce – a topic featuring prominently in some public service reform work I’m undertaking here. Queensland is by no means alone in this; most governments around the world are dealing with the same challenge. The finger of blame is often pointed at either poor pay and conditions or a supposed loss in the value of public service.

The unfortunate but common reaction is often to focus effort on internal HR policies like graduate programmes, obscure and weakly transparent ‘talent management’ pools, or ill fitting workforce skills measures. An annoying example of the latter can be found in the UK’s ‘Professional Skills for Government’ model which not only delivered an absurd pre-Adam Smith approach to centrally proscribing generalisation but also used this as a deliberate sleight of hand to avoiding more pressing civil service reform issues.

I’m sure some of these HR policies have a role to play. What they miss though is the more fundamental issue that the ‘offer’ of a career in public service is still too rooted in a 20th Century concept of working life. The hallmarks of that are:

• Hierarchy: a long and weary trudge upwards which pays off when you get to the top of tree but requires excessive amounts of deference and subservience on the way up.
  


• Lack of autonomy: a reluctance to grant autonomy or devolve responsibility to more junior staff. Worse still, holding of power on many of the small but significant employment matters like secondment rules by organisational administrators who wield these in an inappropriate and untargeted manner.
  


• Deferred benefits: most obviously in pensions but also in a more hidden way in eligibility for wider-ranging and juicier roles with experience. These might help motivate when people stick in a single career for 30 years or more but have little relevance to employee aspirations today.
  


• Emphasis on stability and security not reward for risk or testing of boundaries: obvious in both public sector reward strategies and the softer culture and work practices.
  


• Presumption that status still holds or matters to people: I think people have developed a much healthier notion of what individuals are about. So even if the status of senior bureaucrats still stands (which I’m sure it probably doesn’t) it probably has a weaker motivating factor for people in attaining it.
  


• An idle assumption that the traditional concept of ‘public value’ holds: I actually think people still care about contributing to betterment of society. But they do so in a much sharper way – where in the past it could manifest in a more abstract way (e.g. like working in back office or support role of a ‘good’ institution) I think now people want a clearer demonstration of how they individually make a difference.
  

Much more recognition should be given to such changes in the underlying motivations, values and aspirations of employees. People want flexibility, control, better rewards for when they get things right, and a clearer sense of how they individually are making a difference. Therefore I’d suggest a more fundamental package of reform should include to:

• Remove restrictions on entry to public service: there’s still too much monopsonistic activity going on under the guise of recruitment and promotion rules, or irrelevant professional groupings. Even when roles are advertised outside they are often obfuscated in style or mode. Let the people who really want to work in the public service do so, and those who don’t move on.
  


• Be more flexible on pay and conditions: moving away from large numbers of rigid grades to looser banding of roles and more flexibility in reward and role.
  


• Abolish the concept of ‘interchange’ (which only serves to reinforce artificial barriers and too often ends up mired in HR bureaucraticese), instead rewarding wider experience where it genuinely adds value and leaving individuals to make their decisions in the light of this.
  


• Develop more fluid organisation models: for example like the ‘Shamrock Organisation’ model promoted by Charles Handy. This gives scope for people to make public service contributions in a way that retains more of the independence and autonomy that matters to them.
  


• Create more direct chains and reporting lines: which gives people scope to see and be involved in more of the strategic and organisational decision making going on and provides a stronger sense of personal impact.
  


• Find clearer ways to demonstrate how people can make a difference whether in ‘front’ or ‘back’ office roles.
  


• Promote the positive in the brand: public service can actually be an incredible rewarding and enjoyable career. You get to work with smart and committed people, have opportunities to make huge differences to people’s lives and, contrary to popular perception, are often reasonably remunerated.

Aussie rules at the Gabba

I went to my first live Australian rules football match last night with the Brisbane Lions taking on the Adelaide Crows. (Well done whichever brave Adelaidean decided to break the mold of naming the team after the usual Bears, Lions, Tigers, Bulls etc and opt instead for the mythological creature of doom).

I’d seen a few matches on television but found it nigh on impossible to understand what on earth is going on. It’s definitely a sport that needs watching live, as it’s actually tactically very interesting. People say it’s a cross between Gaelic football and Rugby league – the main aim kicking the ball between two centre posts for 6 points or just between these and another set of posts for 1 point. You can call mark (i.e. stop the play and have a free kick) it you catch it from a kick, but also pass by hand (but then obviously not call mark). So the main action is in and around the range from the goals where it's reasonably reachable.

But it certainly reminded me of a few other sports too. It’s played on cricket pitch (last night at the Gabba which hosts the cricket tests from October), and has the athleticism and pettiness of football, the length of US sports (it ran for about 3 hours over four quarters), and the scores (and scoring patterns) of basketball.

In the end Brisbane Lions won 83 to 70 after pulling off a remarkable and decisive turnaround in the final quarter. The Gabba itself is also a very impressive stadium (see Panarama shot below).

Worst policy idea ever? (1)

The first contender in what I suspect may become a rather long list of irritatingly stupid and ill-conceived policy ideas is a Treasury initiative called ‘First Home Saver Accounts’. The idea behind it is to enable first time buyers to save a deposit for a home. Government contributes 17% of the first $5,000 saved per year (i.e. up to $850) and provides tax preferential status to the accounts at 15% (as opposed to the up to 45% they might otherwise face).

Individuals can withdraw their account balance tax free to buy or build a first home in which to live. So what on earth could be wrong with helping dispossessed and defenceless first-time buyers in this way? Well …

• A lack of problem definition: at an average age of 34 Australian first-time buyers are not particularly old by international or historical comparisons, especially relative to the long term trends for later entry into working and family life;

• No evidence to justify role for government: a complete lack of argument is provided for why government should subsidise first-time buyers. (I’d be willing, though skeptical, to hear an argument based on life satisfaction or community cohesion but it’s not there);

• It’s completely untargeted: there’ll be huge deadweight losses from people who would have bought properties without the generous government support;

• Likely to be regressive: I suspect it’ll be savvy young professionals who’ll take most advantage of the scheme (and the $5k a year limit) rather than the low paid key workers for whom there may just about be a rationale for government action to help (although even then it would probably represent a second-best approach to policies like having more locally-determined pay rates);

• It ignores the real problem: which is that in one of the world’s most urbanised countries supply constraints relating to housing density and developer-hording are the most significant to overcome (indeed even a first year economics student could identify some rather perverse consequences of ramping up demand without ability of supply to respond);

• Easy to exploit: eligibility is broad and provisions to prevent abuse weak. For example, you only need to be ‘resident’ in the property for six months, and I suspect even within that window it’d be quite easy to get away with renting it on the side;

• Expensive: the direct exchequer cost of the subsidy will be up to $850 per person. Of course there’ll be a further hidden cost associated with the tax revenues forgone from granting the accounts a preferential tax status. And, with no cap on take-up the programme could easily start running into tens or even hundreds of millions dollars;

• It’s just political pandering: offering sweeties to vocal groups at the expense of the rest of us. Which is not merely politics at its lowest common denominator but also nothing short of a signal to more such nonsensical initiatives to come sniffing at the politicians’ trough.

Environmental behaviour change

I found a great and simple example of environmental behaviour change at work in a Queensland programme called 'Target 140', which stems from chronic water shortage issues in northern Australia. On the supply side the problems are threefold. First, there’s generally not enough rain. Second, when it does come it’s highly erratic with often several seasons passing without rain and then it being dumped down in a couple of days. Third, there’s traditionally been little or no coordination between local water agencies to the extent that there’s a critical absence of hard and soft infrastructure to share water supply (which in a tropical and highly localised weather system is absolutely critical).

Finally, on the demand side there have been weak incentives to bear down on consumption with fixed water rates and lack of price variability even when capacity becomes critical. Together these factors resulted in dam water levels in South-East Queensland falling to 5% of capacity by 2006. In comes Target 140, which is run by a new inter-governmental water commission agency. So what makes it successful as a behaviour change campaign? In my view:

• The establishment of a clear target (of getting consumption down to 140 litres of water per person per day) provides focus for individual attainment and catalyses on the human competitive spirit
  
  
• The provision of simple information and guidance about how to make adaptations in daily work and personal routines enables people to switch to new or adaptive forms of behaviour



• Real time data on dam water levels drives both a sense of urgency and communality in driving down consumption



• Rebates for purchasing water-saving devices address inertia in investing in environmental technology that have medium to long term payoffs



• Fines for excess use (with clearly defined levels) codify what the undesired behaviour is and provide an active disincentive against it



• People can trade off following the ‘pro-social’ behaviour (e.g. with household signs identifying you as a user of rainwater capture)
  

Since the Target 140 campaign was established average water consumption has fallen over 40%. Very impressive considering the cost to government was negligible (indeed the cost-benefit ratios must be several thousand times the equivalent for infrastructure investment to achieve the same outcome).

It makes me reflect on my own foray into the behaviour change literature in writing the discussion paper 'Achieving Culture Change: a Policy Framework'. I think one of things I failed to adequately convey is that behaviour change doesn’t necessarily require incredibly sophisticated or involved programmes. Simple measures based around a robust understanding of human motivations work. What it does require though is being politically bold when times demand. Target 140 is a good such example.

Strategy in government

One of the things that seems have recently dawned on the Government is that an ambitious reforming agenda kind of requires a public service that is fit for purpose. Rudd’s recent attack on the public service backfired somewhat, although there’s more considered thought going on about how to beef up the Government’s analytical and strategy capacity. As an example see Rudd’s speech on public services.

So today I gave a talk on what makes for a good strategy function in government, drawing on (in my view) the lessons of the UK’s Strategy Unit. My magically neat recipe of 10 ingredients was:

1. Have a clear commissioning structure: responsive to needs and priorities but also two-way exchange (‘intelligent customers’)


2. Be flexible in recruiting: control of recruitment, flexible on T & Cs, mix of backgrounds, international experience, analytically superb


3. Keep a flat structure with few hierarchical chains, mostly relatively senior roles, commission out work, regularly bring in new staff


4. Manage a mixed portfolio of work and try to balance over time (surges/ troughs)


5. Invest in intellectual capital and have clear knowledge management processes


6. Prioritise quality control (e.g. red-teaming, critical friends, steering groups)


7. Have a consistent and long term approach to stakeholder management


8. Clear about the need to both master the analytical trends but also see the big-picture (i.e. tradeoffs, narrative, framing of choices)


9. Be inclusive and outward-looking to avoid group-think (e.g. think-tanks, academia)


10. Be forward-looking: anticipate the future trends and policy challenges in short/medium/long term (e.g. horizon scanning)
    
    

Against these the Strategy Unit probably got better over the years in relation to its commissioning structures, analytical capacity and knowledge management processes. It probably slipped a bit on actually generating the ideas in the first place, and is arguably, though perhaps necessarily, more introspective and short-term focused than ever.

Overall though I think the UK’s Strategy Unit is still the premier organisation of its type anywhere in the world; if Rudd does want to beef up capacity here he would do no harm drawing heavily on its model.