Rees' 1st anniversary

What a ramshackle first anniversary for Nathan Rees:

* A state down the toilet in every sense of the word;
* A squabbling Labor party;
* A stalemate in the Legislative Council;
* A court system in disarray;
* A stupid spin doctor programme called 13 Super Departments;
* A crumbling public sector;
* Hospitals well and truly stuffed;
* No plans and no work done to improve the transport for the south west and north west of Sydney
* Rural/regional services stretched beyond breaking

And now the self-serving interests of the business community comes on line to haunt Rees.
Bring on the state election now!

Finally Public Administration in NSW Under the Gun

Finally there is some mainstream media discussion of the public administration policies of the NSW Government! An excerpt from Beverley Kingston's essay in Sydney Ideas Quarterly has been published in today's edition of the Sydney Morning Herald.

Kingston refers to the problem as the "rotting core". She quite rightly points out that once upon a time the management of departments involved people who stood up to ministers and who could plan long term regardless of who was running Macquarie Street. Now the senior bureaucrats are mere puppets and political animals who do their masters' bidding. They fulfil stupid contracts and write up reports of their performance indicators and claim that they "led" the department in doing x, y, and z.

Usually the executive bureaucrat does nothing at all in working out the details of x, y and z because the schemes are delegated to employees who do the grunt work. Employees are rarely thanked but are expected to deliver results irrespective of whether scheme was feasible in the first place.

When a scheme goes belly up the senior executive bureaucrat reacts like a pit-bull attacking employees. Executive bureaucrats like to take credit but never the responsibility for orchestrating things that may be plain stupid, unworkable or even implausible. These days there seems to be no regard for deep intelligence, skill, and acquired knowledge needed to run departments.

Kingston says:
"The instructions coming from the top are not necessarily informed or relevant, but frequently overwhelm the ability of individuals with expert on-the-spot knowledge to take an initiative or defy a direction."

How true! I've seen senior bureaucrats react with sandpit temper tantrums when someone with intelligence tells the boss the facts of life run contrary to the proposed policy or scheme.

That's why a colonic irrigation clean-out is needed: Directors-General of departments and their deputy subordinate sycophants must go from the NSW public service. The places to start the clean-up are the departments of Health, Attorney General, and Transport.

Another Lame Duck Premier About To Depart

Yes, it is just a mere formality before Nathan Rees ceases to be Premier of NSW and a new marionette show orchestrated from the right-wing faction of the ALP begins. The choice of a woman - Kristina Keneally or Carmel Tebbutt - will be a change of puppet for sure. But the lads in Sussex Street miss the point: we are not fooled by the attempt to imitate Queensland with Anna Bligh.

As the Upper House relationship between the ALP and the Shooters Party remains at a stalemate the prospect of a hung Parliament needing to be dissolved for an election looms large.

The members of Cabinet should be asking themselves how did they end up in this mess. All they have to do is think back to the absurd lobbying of Laurie Glanfield and John Hatzistergos over the merger of the Protective Commissioner and Public Trustee in June. They secured the passage for that via wooing The Greens in exchange for stuffing up The Shooter's bill on bang-bangs in National Parks. If Glanfield and Hatzistergos had not been so adamant about pushing through on that issue then maybe Labor would still have The Shooters onside. Now they don't and it is impossible to govern the state without at least 3 secure votes from minor parties.

Premier Rees Takes A Vacation! Ha!

Premier Rees has vanished for the week before Parliament resumes. That gives the gals and boys time now to sharpen their daggers when Caesar returns for the frenzied Ides of March doom that awaits him. More puppetry of the Premier show!

Nicholas Cowdery: Appoint Him As NSW Attorney General

What a stinking piece of crap this article is in the Sun Herald about Nicholas Cowdery the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions. It allows John Hatzistergos to make all kinds of assertions about Mr Cowdery, while it seems the Attorney General is conveniently hoping that no one will put the spotlight on the Chernobyl-like melt-down that has rooted his entire Department.

Nicholas Cowdery seems to have a fine legal mind and has more astute judgment about the policy crap that clogs up the NSW Public Sector. I'd support Mr Cowdery being made Attorney General!

Memo to Rees: Don't Try To Deflect Attention

Which spin-doctor dreamed up this silly piece of nonsense for Nathan Rees to sprout about "maybe it is time for a new national flag"? This is a sign of sheer desperation to try and divert attention from the abominable administrative mess blighting the NSW State Government and NSW Public Sector.

UPDATE:
Barry O'Farrell quite rightly sticks it to the Premier on the drivel about the flag.

Changing the Puppet in Macquarie Street

Only a couple of weeks to go until the deadlocked NSW Parliament resumes "business". And the demise of Nathan Rees as Premier-Puppet seems assured. There will be a Punch-and-Judy-Show and then another puppet will appear.

The ALP in NSW is wasting its time because the whole Labor Government is no longer a patient in intensive care. No the Labor Government is just another body in the fridge waiting for the overworked coroner to do the post-mortem!

We look forward with a yawn to the next "Sooty Show" from Labor.

More Significant Jobs To Go From Probate Registry

I've heard before that the Probate registry at the NSW Supreme Court has been under-resourced. Now I hear that some senior jobs will be abolished. I'm hearing that private legal practitioners are aghast about the sword of Damocles falling on the registrars.

It seems that there are several Sooty-like glove-puppets that have been posted in various parts of the Attorney General's Department and agencies. They do their master's bidding, boss the employees around, all in the name of efficiency. The chanting about "efficiency" sounds like some codeword for a KGB covert operation: target and eliminate!

Meanwhile several other government departments are cash-starved and under-staffed, and that is what is supposed to pass for saving money and improving services. Some departments cannot even afford to brief out for fully outsourced legal opinions because it costs too much. So half-baked requests are made as if "near enough is good enough".

Makes a mockery of Nathan Rees' claim that his government is all about creating "jobs, jobs, jobs."

The cut-slash-burn approach to the public sector is disastrous for the people who lose employment, disastrous for those left who have to carry more tasks, and of course ensures that there can never be "better value" and "better service" to the public. Why is it that talentless individuals rise to the top of bureaucracy, and are rarely made to walk the plank for idiotic decisions? Won't be very long now until the mega-earthquake hits and everything in the public sector crashes in a heap.

Nathan Rees Admits Failings!!

Good on ya Nathan Rees -- it's nice to know that you work your guts out 17 hrs per day and you run a lousy government! Beautiful confession in the Daily Telegraph. And now Nathan you know how we all feel about you from the Newspoll showing the Coalition is preferred to Labor and Barry O'Farrell is preferred to you. Bye bye Labor - the rout wil be colossal in March 2011!

NSW RailCorp - Beautiful Under Staffing!

No grand revelation really because we all know that the railways are stuffed up but today's Sydney Morning Herald points out the serious failure to replace 22 staff positions at Town Hall. Another wonderful example of the hollowness of Nathan Rees' mantra about his government being on about "jobs, jobs, jobs".

NSW Director of Public Prosecutions

Give Mr Cowdery the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions a cigar! He has the guts to stand up to the crap dished out by the NSW Labor Government and the NSW Attorney General John Hatzistergos.

Barry O'Farrell - Please Try Harder

Barry O'Farrell seems a nice enough bloke and landed the mantle of Liberal Party leader in 2007 after the debacle caused by the far right of the party and the pathetic campaigning of Mr Debnam.

Barry, you've got to land some good punches on Labor and to roll out your policies to convince us that we should elect you.

You have nominated the issue of Party donations in today's paper. Yes, that sounds nice. However, we need to hear more from you and about realistic policies.

NSW is dead. It has to be kick started again. Labor has to go. The deadlock of minor parties in the upper house has to be resolved.

The SES bureaucrats who slavishly borrow idiotic faddish ideas from corporate consultancy have to be booted out. They also have to go because they fail to advise the Government and simply boot-lick their master's boots.

A complete colonic irrigation of all the offices of Director General of NSW departments is essential. That is how to have reform. Not the moronic Super Department model, and certainly not the parrot-fashion chirping of "efficiency" and "better service" as doublethink for sacking frontline and back office employees in the public sector.

Joe Tripodi -- the last part of the umbilical cord??

Perhaps the last splice on the umbilical cord needed to cut Nathan Rees loose is found in which way the wind blows for Joe Tripodi. It is a pity that Ian Macdonald is not removed simultaneously!

And need we be surprised that the NSW Police attrition rates are rising? All part and parcel of the defunct and dysfunctional policies and practices implemented by the moguls at the top of the public sector --- Police officers completing performance indicator sheets, and other such tripe! The NSW public sector is awash with superfluous paperwork dreamed up by consultants who are handsomely paid for artificial and needless advice.

A Funny Thing Happened to NSW State Plan!

Yes folks a funny thing has happened to the NSW State Plan - most bets are off it seems as the targets set by the plan are unattainable! Ha! Gee you do not have to qualify as a member of Mensa to figure out that the State Plan was sheer PR.

NSW Cabinet Deck Chair Reshuffle Touted

The cliff-hanger to the next episode of "The Bland and The Boring" is all about Premier Rees' threats to demote a few cabinet ministers for disloyalty. Yes Mr Kelly and Mr Macdonald ought to be pensioned off but then so should most of the cabinet and indeed most of the Labor MPs sitting in NSW Parliament. So gee wow what a difference a new cabinet will make to a bankrupt government, an over-worked and under-resourced public sector, and infrastructure that cannot match community needs (let alone future development)!

The Premier does not seem to understand that public sympathy for him has been washing away in the past few months as he stumbles from crisis to crisis and arbitrarily back-flips on hasty decisions. In fact the public could care less about the internal party bickering and ego-centric ambitions of those desiring the purple mantle.

As Lisa Carty indicates the Super Department plan for public sector reform is a big botched mess. Blind Freddy could have told the Premier that all these decisions about reform and cabinet reshuffle are attempts at cosmetic cover-ups for the immense mess the state is in.

NSW Premier Circles the Wagons

Hahahaha! NSW Premier Rees is circling the wagons, so it seems, to fend off any challenges by dissenting MPs to his mantle. Read about the latest episode in the NSW Labor soap-opera "the bland and the boring". Recall Bob Hawke's statement? "If you can't govern your party you can't govern the country." Paraphrased: "if you can't govern your Labor mates, you certainly cannot govern the state of NSW!"

Ides of March for Premier Rees

Media beat-up or snap-shot of internal Labor party dissent? That maybe a question to pose about claims that Mr Della Bosca has sharpened his political blade for an eventual seizure of power. Yet also waiting in the wings with his blade is Mr Sartor. Labor still seems to think it can win in 2011, and that their primary worry is who will be Premier. The clowns in the party just do not get it: we the public don't care which marionette stars in the Labor comedy hour. The public are ready to ditch Labor. You lot have been in too long, and it is irrelevant what cosmetic efforts are made at appearing to engage in party renewal.

Add to this the burgeoning dissent from the people who are employed in the public sector who are expected to work like indentured labourers in the cotton fields. The state is buggered up so badly, and there's no point blaming the global crisis. This is a grotesque mess created inside NSW by the boys and gals in Governor Macquarie Tower, and seconded by the sycophantic bureaucrats who run their little departmental empires with a gross and exaggerated sense of self-importance.

The current batch of Labor politicians are tuckered out and talentless and dull and boring and irrelevant. The little Napoleonic syndrome that infests the Senior Executive Service likewise shows how tedious heads of departments can become. Change is coming to NSW, and I don't vote Liberal!

Poly-Filler Pasting Over NSW Govt Cracks

The pounding hooves of the horses of doom are approaching as Premier Rees is shown yet again to be a marionette. He faces:

1). The plots of John Della Bosca eyeing off the purple mantle of the Premier's job, and of course there are the usual media denials from Della Bosca (which is the script challengers recite when planning the Ides of March).

2). The stalemate over regaining the support of The Shooters Party in the Legislative Council which was caused by the determined and stubborn lobbying activities of the NSW Attorney General John Hatzistergos and Mr Laurie Glanfield the Director General of the Attorney General's Department in June 2009 in pushing through - come hell or highwater - the NSW Trustee and Guardian Bill. The Government did a deal with The Greens on that Bill, and in return Labor dudded The Shooters Party's bill about shooting in national parks. This has led to stalemate over the sale of NSW Lotteries (so essential so the Treasurer Eric Roozendaal claims to making the budget work).

3). The revolt of 8 Labor MPs over the privatisation of prisons.

4). The rearranging of deck chairs to dampen down dissent from Rural Fire Services over the Super Department scheme.

Full steam ahead as we hit the iceberg!

NSW Public Sector Reforms (Shipwrecked Again)

It's reassuring to know that we are receiving better value and better services under the Super Department scheme. Oh, what's that you say? You mean there are state government ministers squabbling over who has which department reporting?

Alexandra Smith dishes up the latest episode of the government soap-opera "the bland and the boring".

Daily Telegraph on Case Chaos at New Trustee and Guardian

Gemma Jones serves up a concise piece on funds mismanagement and clumsy ham-fisted handling of protected estates clients by the Protective Commisisoner's successor the NSW Trustee and Guardian. While that kind of work is always fraught with problems, the snap shot in the article just emphasises what a mess is the entire Attorney General's Department. Both the minister Mr John Hatzistergos and the department's Director General Mr Laurie Glanfield need to be hauled before an inquiry to justify why they should be allowed to continue in their jobs.

And don't overlook the farcical handling of the current Parliamentary Inquiry into substitute decision making as it affects the NSW Trustee and Guardian (see here). Both the Minister and Director General should be cross-examined on several critical concerns particularly why they dragged their feet since 2004 in introducing any reforms to the Protected Estates Act.

Super Department Inferno

The NSW Labor Government continues to have excellent form as it lurches from one ridiculous proposal and crisis and onto the next proposal/crisis.

The pixels had barely settled on John Lee's electronic announcement assuring better service and value via 13 Super Departments than the wheels began falling off.

This plan to amalgamate is touted as a huge reform in the public sector. All it really is something akin to a Cecil De Mille epic scene of a grand disaster: simultaneously rearranging deck chairs on many sinking ships.

One more sign of serious dissent comes from the Rural Fire Service's revolt at being merged after seeking reassurances that they would be left untouched. The Sun Herald's Lisa Carty indicates that Phil Koperberg has fired a shot across Nathan Rees' bow, and that three other ministers are disgruntled at the lack of consultation over this "super-reform": Paul Lynch, David Borger, and Graham West. Read Lisa's article (here).

The restructure simply creates more red-tape, increases a top-heavy bureaucracy, and contrary to all rhetoric does not release employees from tedious and irrelevant tasks to serve the public.

The Government and its minders are beholden to a scavanger culture of advisors who speak the dialect of management-speak, and spawn spin doctor propaganda. This is truly a clueless government, and its senior executive service corps is riddled with sycophants and power-hungry self-serving political creatures.