Generally speaking the PS provides a service to the people of Australia and elected officials. The problem is that there are too many similar/ alike roles carried out by several people where one would be sufficient. I have found that often public servants become surly in their attitudes such as “ I know better than you”, they, with some exceptions, are not hard working only doing what is absolutely necessary and that stems from poor performing Supervisors who are only interested in personal promotion. You only have to visit a Centrelink/ Medicare Centre, where service is poor at best because the employees have an attitude of “I have a job and I am safe in that job, why do more than I have to”. The upper echelon of Public Servants are paid an obscene amount of money for giving bad advice to who ever they report to. The Chief of staff to the PM earns more money than the PM and that is the biggest problem and issue and all the way down the line. These are ordinary people with a certain skill set being paid way over their ability or responsibility. Why are Public Servant treated as special when it comes to remuneration, Superannuation and other conditions of employment, they should be treated the same as all other employees within Industry of similar responsibilities and accountability, have a clear job description with specific necessary qualifications, setting out the expected key expectations and actual results achieved before being employed in a particular position. Prospective employees are required to be politically neutral to ensure that information given and decisions are made are for the right reasons and not for political expediency. At the moment the system favours politically oriented people to ensure a specific outcome which is not in the interest of the Australian people. Stop the use of outside organisations to update/ inform/ instruct/ guide Public Servants or the Public Service, if that is necessary then the wrong people are employed.
