Departments reveal how many diversity and inclusion roles exist

The Coalition’s vow to slash diversity and inclusion roles in its quest to cut thousands of public service jobs would only deliver a sliver of savings, as several government departments reveal their staff comprise small teams of 10 or fewer workers.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and the Coalition’s government efficiency spokeswoman Jacinta Price have singled out “DEI” – “diversity, equity and inclusion”, a shorthand more common in the United States – roles as part of their election commitment to eliminate waste from the federal public service.

Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, the Coalition’s government efficiency spokeswoman.Credit: James Brickwood

They have not committed to a firm number of job cuts, but say the 36,000 public servant roles added under Labor was too many, in a political fight reminiscent of US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s campaign to clean up the American bureaucracy.

Price told Sky News on Thursday the Coalition was still identifying “waste” in the public service, singling out DEI as a focus.

“I think we’ve always said there’s no way we’re going to get rid of the frontline when it comes to the public service, but there are certainly those within the DEI space that are probably unnecessary,” she said.

But a survey by this masthead reveals those roles make up less than one per cent of major departments.

Treasury said it had two positions working on employment issues that included diversity and inclusion among its workforce of 1581.

The Attorney-General’s Department has four staff members in its human resources team that support diversity and inclusion-related functions as part of their role – 0.18 per cent of its 2207-person workforce.

The Department of Parliamentary Services, which includes Parliament House’s workforce, said it employed five people in its culture, change and inclusion section.

Revelations by former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins alleging she was raped on a couch in a ministerial office prompted actions to clean up the culture in Parliament House, including the department’s introduction of an accessibility and inclusion plan in 2020.

Others, including the departments of Health and Aged Care, Meteorology, Services Australia, Industry, Science and Resources, Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, and Prime Minister and Cabinet, said they had “small teams”.

Elon Musk and Donald Trump’s department of government efficiency aims to take an axe to the public service. Credit: Getty

The Australian Taxation Office and National Disability Insurance Agency declined to specify the numbers of their diversity-related roles.

Sarah Liu, founder of Asia-Pacific diversity and inclusion consulting company TDC Global, said it was typical for government departments to have teams of three or four people, who performed three main functions: education and training (to educate employees about what diversity and inclusion means); embedding diversity policies in their organisation; and making sure practices are compliant with the law, particularly discrimination law.

“Australia’s public sector hires the most diversity and inclusion individuals compared to other sectors, while banking and financial services are second,” she said.

“That’s partially because the government is a large employer, but also they need to be the most compliant around governance, policies and legal requirements.”

It is a different landscape to the US, which Liu said served a larger market and had a more polarised debate around diversity and inclusion.

A LinkedIn analysis of 500,000 US roles found a 168.9 per cent increase in “chief” positions in diversity and inclusion between 2019 and 2022.

“The DEI movement there got very extreme, whereas everywhere else, including Australia, never got to that point. The narrative in the US is that they’re course-correcting. In Australia, that was never our reality. It’s very US-specific,” she said.

“Everywhere else in the world is commonsense DEI: that’s about building equitable practices, so different people of different backgrounds can succeed and be included. It’s not about very politicised issues.”

Liu said the challenge in shrinking a small DEI workforce would be ensuring government departments remained compliant with the Public Service Act and other workplace legislation, such as the Sex Discrimination Act and Racial Discrimination Act.

Under the Public Service Act, it is required to follow a code of conduct, which includes the expectation that it “recognises the diversity of the Australian community and fosters diversity in the workplace”.

A 2013 amendment to the act made it the responsibility of the Public Service Commissioner to implement these functions.

Diversity Australia head Steven Asnicar said politicians calling to slash diversity-related roles didn’t understand their importance.

“It’s an extension of human resource management and people are labelling it under DEI … it also fits into the new respect at work laws,” he said, expressing concern about a “pendulum effect” after a focus on fostering diversity in workplaces.

“There will be a balance on how we do this but right now, it’s a bit up in the air.”

Coalition public service spokeswoman Jane Hume said her party was yet to specify how it would reduce the size of the bureaucracy, but pledged they would “announce [their] policy ahead of the next election”.

Price declined to comment.

Public Service Minister Katy Gallagher said the Coalition’s pledged cuts should concern the public.

“You can’t cut 20 per cent of the public service without cutting the services Australians rely on,” a spokesperson said.

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