Trouble plagued eHealth project gets $140 million to continue pending review

Tony Abbott couldn’t get eHealth running as John Howard’s Health Minister. But the long march to digitise medicine will continue.

13 May, 2014

NICTA told to get private funding after 2016

Australia’s tech powerhouse becomes a victim of its own commercial success.

13 May, 2014

Cormann’s laundry list of mergers and cuts

Consolidations galore as the bureaucratic round-up begins.

13 May, 2014

Second wave of APS retrenchments put on hold… at least for now

Third and biggest wave of agency amalgamations scheduled for MYEFO 2014-15.

13 May, 2014

Abolitions and sell-offs galore as authorised Budget leaks abound

Money making mint to be sold, loss-making Australia Post kept, corporate watchdog registry slips leash.

13 May, 2014

Budget 2014: Hockey forced to junk target of 26,500 APS job cuts

Treasurer Joe Hockey has prevailed over hard-line factional rivals after the government started to massage down its APS job shedding estimates and moderate its message over the level of deep cuts needed.

12 May, 2014

Total APS job cuts too difficult to predict for Public Service Commission

By Julian Bajkowski The Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) has released its annual stocktake of the federal bureaucracy with the grim warning that it is now “difficult to predict” how the cumulative impact of successive rounds of job cuts under both the Coalition and Labor will hit staff numbers. Tabled in Parliament on Monday afternoon, […]

2 December, 2013

Abbott says federal job cuts of 12,000 will be it

By Julian Bajkowski Opposition leader Tony Abbott has sought hose down rising fears that between 20,000 and 30,000 federal public service jobs will ultimately be axed in a repeat of Howard-era mass public service sackings in Canberra, taking to national radio on the ABC to pledge that only 12,000 jobs will go. Mr Abbott told […]

5 September, 2013

Contention over muzzling government employee Tweets

By Charles Power* Social media is good for business.  However when the business of an organisation is the development of government policy, the use of Twitter, Facebook and other platforms by public servants can create problems. This was certainly the experience of the Commonwealth Department of Immigration who discovered an officer using the Twitter handle’ […]

20 August, 2013

Abbott reaffirms 12,000 Commonwealth jobs to go

By Julian Bajkowski Federal Opposition leader Tony Abbott has used his Budget reply speech to reaffirm a previous promise to eliminate 12,000 Commonwealth jobs from the public service if elected. The recommitment to slash public service positions comes just one night after Treasurer Wayne Swan allayed fears of mass redundancies by announcing that only around […]

16 May, 2013

NSW public servants set for Monday stop work

By Julian Bajkowski A mass rally of New South Wales public sector workers protesting the O’Farrell government’s plans to slash around 10,000 jobs from agencies is primed to kick off a fresh round of industrial strife in the state as unions muscle-up to try and prevent sackings. The Public Sector Association is urging its members […]

5 October, 2012

Attitudes toward the public service

By James Whelan The Centre for Policy Development has released a report looking at the attitudes toward the public service. It draws on a range of sources and examines the perspectives of community members, Australian politicians and public servants. Attitudes toward the public service matter and important decisions are based on actual and assumed attitudes. […]

4 November, 2011

Calls to Close the Gap within the public-service

The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) this week urged the Federal Government to address Indigenous pay gaps in the Australian Public Service (APS). CPSU national secretary Nadine Flood said Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander agencies were under-funded and staff received lower pay rates than colleagues in other APS agencies working at the same level. “The […]

10 February, 2011

New centre of excellence for public policy

By Angela Dorizas The Australian National Institute for Public Policy was launched this week at the Australian National University. Innovation Minister Senator Kim Carr said the Institute would strengthen public policy capabilities across the Australian Public Service. “We have set ambitious goals for a richer, fairer and greener Australia and we cannot deliver them without […]

8 February, 2011