It's very rare to see an analysis of this kind, with a very real attempt to draw out the implications for the depiction and public understanding of politics and governance. It's a bit of a worry. I remember the NZ TV series about the public service which forever undermined public confidence in our system, showing self-serving nine-to-fivers in cardigans drinking cups of tea and getting nowhere with their designated tasks. That must have shaped current public perceptions of bloat and incompetence which has inspired the swingeing public sector cuts in what otherwise is by many standards a reasonably effective bureaucratic system.
You're right that it's easy to criticise the public sector. Failures are often obvious; successes are taken for granted. I mostly write about areas I'd like to see improvements, but every tax season, it's a pleasure to watch Americans be flabbergasted when they hear about how the IRD processes most returns automatically and sends anyone who's overpaid a cheque! We're lucky to live in a country where most systems simply work (thanks to those nine-to-fivers), and we rarely have to think about them.
That being said, I do see a duty for those of us interested in politics to work to ensure this remains the case, and is even improved, if possible. Old cultures and incentive structures no longer hold when labour mobility is high and average tenures are measured in months rather than decades. We face both serious headwinds and significant opportunities as a result of changing technology and nature of work, as I write about here:
I will take a look. The thing about the tax return is that our income tax system is so straightforward once we got rid of all the write-offs and complexities in the 1980s.
That said, the public service could do a lot more to help themselves - such as publish easily accessible and widely distributed performance measures, benchmarking against overseas entities (including showing how our numbers and performance measure up), and so on.
I follow an outfit in the UK called the Institute for Government, and they have a whole culture of taking the public service seriously, looking at dealing with empire-building and under-performance, how to get rid of arm's length outfits past their use-by date etc etc. What we have here, instead, is tax cuts from an incoming government that are unfunded almost certainly likely to add to debt, but the public service is the sacrificial lamb with the decisions left to public service leaders rather than following some rational plan of cutting out dead wood, improving performance etc.
For example, the idea that you can cut back office functions without harming frontline is a myth. I have seen it in my time on the ADHB where almost all IT systems were practically on their knees, and all because the depreciation and other sums that might have been set off to replace and rationalise them are plundered for clinical services - which happens in the best of systems, but particularly badly in those where governments are simply not prepared to invest. We were told that the immunisation system was "on its last legs", and this just before the pandemic (when we had to rebuild the damn thing). That should never happen, but it does all over the place where governments are not prepared to set aside funds for infrastructure and make an argument for the case (with the taxpayers' union barking at the sidelines).
Thanks for the recommendation regarding the UK's IfG. Certainly I've been thinking for some time that New Zealand sorely lacks such an institution.
I'd suggest that, especially for such a small country, NZ is reasonably well served by policy-oriented think tanks that cover the political spectrum but are also frequently in contact with one another and challenging one another's ideas at conferences and so forth. The scale of Wellington provides some advantages here, by contrast to London or Washington, say. For example, the issues you've raised here regarding the implications of this government's ill-considered tax cuts have been well-covered by both left and right-leaning economists. Of course, politicians are not obliged to listen, as we've seen very dramatically over the last few days in the US.
Yet, we're curiously unfocused on effectiveness, We lack the critique, the institutions, and the routine benchmarking, as you note. It's something I'm trying to help address through these essays, and perhaps more formally in the not-too-distant future. There'll be an announcement here - I hope you might like to be involved.
It's very rare to see an analysis of this kind, with a very real attempt to draw out the implications for the depiction and public understanding of politics and governance. It's a bit of a worry. I remember the NZ TV series about the public service which forever undermined public confidence in our system, showing self-serving nine-to-fivers in cardigans drinking cups of tea and getting nowhere with their designated tasks. That must have shaped current public perceptions of bloat and incompetence which has inspired the swingeing public sector cuts in what otherwise is by many standards a reasonably effective bureaucratic system.
Which series was this? Not sure I've heard of it.
You're right that it's easy to criticise the public sector. Failures are often obvious; successes are taken for granted. I mostly write about areas I'd like to see improvements, but every tax season, it's a pleasure to watch Americans be flabbergasted when they hear about how the IRD processes most returns automatically and sends anyone who's overpaid a cheque! We're lucky to live in a country where most systems simply work (thanks to those nine-to-fivers), and we rarely have to think about them.
That being said, I do see a duty for those of us interested in politics to work to ensure this remains the case, and is even improved, if possible. Old cultures and incentive structures no longer hold when labour mobility is high and average tenures are measured in months rather than decades. We face both serious headwinds and significant opportunities as a result of changing technology and nature of work, as I write about here:
https://alethios.substack.com/p/generational-reform
Would be interested in your thoughts.
I will take a look. The thing about the tax return is that our income tax system is so straightforward once we got rid of all the write-offs and complexities in the 1980s.
That said, the public service could do a lot more to help themselves - such as publish easily accessible and widely distributed performance measures, benchmarking against overseas entities (including showing how our numbers and performance measure up), and so on.
I follow an outfit in the UK called the Institute for Government, and they have a whole culture of taking the public service seriously, looking at dealing with empire-building and under-performance, how to get rid of arm's length outfits past their use-by date etc etc. What we have here, instead, is tax cuts from an incoming government that are unfunded almost certainly likely to add to debt, but the public service is the sacrificial lamb with the decisions left to public service leaders rather than following some rational plan of cutting out dead wood, improving performance etc.
For example, the idea that you can cut back office functions without harming frontline is a myth. I have seen it in my time on the ADHB where almost all IT systems were practically on their knees, and all because the depreciation and other sums that might have been set off to replace and rationalise them are plundered for clinical services - which happens in the best of systems, but particularly badly in those where governments are simply not prepared to invest. We were told that the immunisation system was "on its last legs", and this just before the pandemic (when we had to rebuild the damn thing). That should never happen, but it does all over the place where governments are not prepared to set aside funds for infrastructure and make an argument for the case (with the taxpayers' union barking at the sidelines).
Thanks for the recommendation regarding the UK's IfG. Certainly I've been thinking for some time that New Zealand sorely lacks such an institution.
I'd suggest that, especially for such a small country, NZ is reasonably well served by policy-oriented think tanks that cover the political spectrum but are also frequently in contact with one another and challenging one another's ideas at conferences and so forth. The scale of Wellington provides some advantages here, by contrast to London or Washington, say. For example, the issues you've raised here regarding the implications of this government's ill-considered tax cuts have been well-covered by both left and right-leaning economists. Of course, politicians are not obliged to listen, as we've seen very dramatically over the last few days in the US.
Yet, we're curiously unfocused on effectiveness, We lack the critique, the institutions, and the routine benchmarking, as you note. It's something I'm trying to help address through these essays, and perhaps more formally in the not-too-distant future. There'll be an announcement here - I hope you might like to be involved.
Roger Hall's Gliding On
Interesting and thought provoking. Thank you.
Did you happen to watch the NZ TV series "The Pretender?" Also an interesting look at a Minister and his office with an MMP flavor