Steven Miles’s Budget Estimates assistant in job title change
A public servant changed a job description to avoid it reflecting poorly on the State Labor Government.
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A job description was altered to disguise the fact another bureaucrat was being hired to hand-hold Health Minister Steven Miles through State Parliament’s annual Budget question-and-answer session.
The Courier-Mail can reveal the job title for a new staffer who joined Queensland Health’s three-person Estimates team was altered earlier this year to avoid embarrassing news coverage.
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“I think, given the media coverage of the director role, to have another role that had Estimates in its title is not a good look,” the director of Estimates wrote to colleagues in January after her own high-profile appointment in late 2019.
“I have attached the role as it currently is and then a version with some suggested changes.
“I don’t think removing references to Estimates will in any way substantively change the role…”
The bureaucrat did worry whether removing the word from the new hire’s title would “draw any attention” as they would be working with others with Estimates in their titles.
“We have put a hold on any recruitment until we ‘workshop’ this,” she wrote.
The position was ultimately filled as a briefings and liaison officer, with the Estimates reference dropped.
Right to Information documents released to the Opposition reveal the behind-the-scenes process in readying Mr Miles and his Director-General for the annual Estimates process, including how 54 bureaucrats are roped in across the public service to provide briefings on the inner workings of the department.
Three “mock sessions” are also scheduled across a fortnight to help them prepare for when they face government and Opposition MPs to answer Budget questions.
Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington dubbed the Estimates team an “undercover unit” that was part of a Palaszczuk Government “culture of cover-up and secrecy”.
“Instead of spending your taxes on schools, hospitals and infrastructure, Labor is pouring public money to conceal information,” she said.
Queensland Health did not answer questions around why a public servant had made a political decision to change a job title to avoid media scrutiny.
“Estimates is core to our democratic system of government,” a statement read instead.
“We are the biggest, most complex part of government with a $19 billion budget and 100,000 staff over 16 HHSs and four statutory bodies.
“No additional roles have been added to support the extensive Estimates process – the team has remained the same size for years.”
The existence of the Estimates Team – the only one to exist across the public service to help a minister prepare – was revealed in November when Queensland Health advertised for a director of Estimates earning up to $162,000.
The Budget team has been deployed to assist in the pandemic response since the 2020-21 budget was postponed due to COVID-19.