Peter Dutton at BayCiss in Victoria (14 November) linked funding for community services to public service employees. Photo: Peter Dutton Facebook.
Canberra bashing has begun in earnest ahead of the next federal election, with the Coalition returning to its favourite chestnut, the size of the public service.
The Federal Opposition is ramping up the attack and making its intentions ever clearer about what it intends to do with the Australian Public Service if the Coalition wins office next year.
Visiting the non-profit community support service BayCISS in Victoria on Thursday (14 November), Opposition Leader Peter Dutton took the opportunity to make a tenuous link between the charity and the public service.
“There are another 30,000 bureaucrats that have been employed in Canberra, and you come out to services like this today who need a number of millions of dollars,” Mr Dutton said.
“But relative to the billions of dollars being spent by the government at the moment, wouldn’t we be better off to help support local services like BayCISS than employing another 30,000 public servants in Canberra?
“Wouldn’t we be better off to try to provide food packages to families who are sleeping rough or sleeping in the back of their cars at the moment? It’s a question of priority.
“You can’t continue just to tax and spend. You have to be responsible; no different to your own household budget.
“I think the difficulty that the government’s got at the moment is that they’ve got all of their priorities wrong.”
The Opposition Leader’s comments came just one day after his shadow foreign affairs minister, Simon Birmingham, fielded questions at the National Press Club about the Coalition’s intentions towards the public service.
“Hello, Canberra,” Senator Birmingham joked before expressing concern about the size of the APS.
“We did have a cap in place as a Coalition government on the size of the public service,” he said.
“This government has lifted it.
“It’s coming at huge ongoing additional budget costs and I’m not sure that anyone can point to the efficiencies that Australians are getting in terms of responsiveness from government as a result.”
The Coalition’s renewed anti-public service push has outraged the Community and Public Sector Union, which says Mr Dutton’s comments, at the very least, are proof of the Opposition’s intentions.
CPSU national secretary Melissa Donnelly said the Opposition Leader is now “champing at the bit” to take an axe to the public services Australians rely on.
“He has a predictable plan for a bare-bones public service, where his mates in big businesses like PwC and KPMG get all the public sector work outsourced to them and charge through the roof for it,” Ms Donnelly said.
“In the final year of the Morrison Government, the outsourcing bill totalled $21 billion and public services were hanging by a thread.”
Ms Donnelly then went on to express support for the support Labor has given the APS.
“Australians are finally beginning to see public sector investment and rebuilding pay off,” she said.
“Centrelink calls are being answered around 7.5 minutes faster and Medicare calls 11.5 minutes faster.
“Congestion messages are down by nearly 80 per cent and claims are being processed more quickly, with Paid Parental Leave claims now being processed within three days, down from 31 days.
“Aged Pension claims are being processed in 49 days, down from 84, and Youth Allowance claims are being processed in 10 days, down from 28.
“If Peter Dutton is going to undo all of this work, he needs to be honest with Australians about what public services he is planning to cut.
“Is he going to cut from Services Australia so that new mums and dads, students and pensioners all have to wait longer?
“Is he going to make cuts that mean it takes longer to get a passport, so it’s easier for diseases to get into the country, so it’s harder for regulators to crack down on his mates in big business price gouging and taking advantage of Australian families?
“Or is he going to cut from DVA [Department of Veterans’ Affairs] so that veterans waiting for support have to wait longer?”
Original Article published by Chris Johnson on Riotact.
