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Advances in cancer treatment are driving big lifts in health care productivity.

Why measuring public sector productivity is so slippery

When Productivity Commission researchers examined past assessments of the health system’s productivity earlier this year, they were pleasantly surprised.

  • Tom Burton

September

When the Albanese government is throwing billions of dollars at its signature Made in Australia scheme, Rupert Taylor-Price says there isn’t an agreed government definition for what it means to be an Australian business.

True blue dilemma: what makes a business Australian?

As the Albanese government prepares to throw billions of dollars at its signature Made in Australia scheme, there is no agreed definition on what makes an Australian business.

  • Tom Burton
Former Department of Human Services secretary Kathryn Campbell.

Top bureaucrat breached code of conduct 12 times during robo-debt

A review has found 12 public servants, including department secretary Kathryn Campbell, breached the public service code of conduct 97 times during the notorious debt recovery scheme.

  • Tom Burton
Former ASIC deputy chairman Karen Chester in Melbourne on Thursday.

Anti-corruption commission clears former ASIC deputy Karen Chester

The National Anti-Corruption Commission has sought to protect against unfair reputation damage, clearing former ASIC deputy chairman Karen Chester of corrupt behaviour

  • Tom Burton

Why ‘body-shopping’ for consultants is dead in Canberra

The firms hardest hit by sharply lower government spending on consulting are those contracting out short- or medium-term advisers to agencies and departments.

  • Edmund Tadros
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An image of former president Donald Trump created by Grok, an artificial intelligence program owned by Elon Musk.

Urgent laws needed to ban AI election fakes

AI-generated fake videos showing political leaders banning gambling advertising have prompted the government to seek the advice of the Electoral Commission.

  • Tom Burton
NSW Health Pathology has generated $280 million in savings.

How to unlock the productivity power of a forgotten sector

There is a renewed push to get better value from the vast array of government services that make up around 20 per cent of the economy.

  • Tom Burton

August

The crowd look on during the 2024 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.

Albanese backflips on sexuality census question

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has agreed to reinstate a census question on sexual orientation, but remains under pressure to survey all gender identities.

  • Tom Burton and Phillip Coorey
The Census is meant to provide a snap shot of the nation.

A culture war is the least of the census’ problems. Let’s get rid of it

A ditched plan to include questions about the LGBTQ community in the census has raised questions about the future of the $600 million big five-yearly national survey.

  • Tom Burton
Work points to staff ratios for federal hybrid working work places is moving from one to one, to eight work points to ten staff members.

Remote working drives down federal office costs

More workers are sharing desks and work stations as part of flexible work, pushing average staff costs down by $850 per worker.

  • Tom Burton
In January 2021, our report on the Voice’s design and potential models was released for public comment.

The $340m government IT disaster no one cared about

The idea was simple enough: one back-office system to better co-ordinate all government departments. A decade later, the plan has been abandoned at big public expense.

  • Tom Burton
Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen, Matt Kean and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at Parliament House in June,

Clean and green but are the new climate tsars conflict free?

Matt Kean’s dual gigs show how limited expertise has brought investors and policymakers uncomfortably close.

  • John Kehoe and Hannah Wootton
The atlas reveals the hidden job market, Melbourne career coach Rebekah Raftopoulos says.

The hidden jobs revealed by the new skills atlas

A new digital jobs and skills atlas shows where the hidden jobs are and reveals surprising new trends, especially in regional Australia.

  • Tom Burton
Chief scientist Cathy Foley said she was surprised by the level of consensus around what the community was looking for from science.

Aussie innovators pushed to focus on five ‘missions’

New priorities, outlined by Science Minister Ed Husic, include the net zero transition, supporting healthy communities and “elevating” Indigenous knowledge systems.

  • Updated
  • Tom Burton
NSW Premier Chris Minns wants public servants to work “principally” from the office.

Hybrid working mishmash for 1.7m government workers across Australia

The NSW government’s push for public servants to work from their offices has left a jumble of work arrangements for the nation’s largest employers.

  • Tom Burton
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The NSW government is expected to lease more property with its McKell building already fully occupied

NSW to lease more offices for public servants ordered back

NSW is ready to lease extra office space after declaring it was time to end pandemic work-from-home conditions for its 80,000 public servants.

  • Tom Burton
Treasury departments need to rethink digital investments argues former NSW minister Victor Dominello.

Five projects to fix Australia’s productivity woes

The answer to the nation’s sagging productivity is staring us in the face says former NSW minister Victor Dominello.

  • Tom Burton

July

Tech meltdown revealed a fundamental flaw in plain sight

The global CrowdStrike breakdown revealed just how much of the global IT system is built on inherently unsafe code.

  • Tom Burton
A reform bill to cap overspending of NDIS plans and to create a better test for determining supports for the scheme has been stalled in the Senate.

Senate urged to pass NDIS bill to get reforms back on track

Disability advocates have called for reforms to the NDIS to be passed despite protests that some recommendations could be catastrophic for the severely disabled.

  • Tom Burton
Middle Australia has every opportunity to rise up the income ranks, according to new Productivity Commission analysis.

Middle Australia is indeed the lucky country

A suite of new data sources has enabled the Productivity Commission to revise its measure of economic mobility. The result surprised everyone.

  • Tom Burton

Original URL: https://www.afr.com/topic/public-service-60z