Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Fleur Fitzsimons: PSA National Secretary on the call to cull ministerial portfolios

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Fleur Fitzsimons: PSA National Secretary on the call to cull ministerial portfolios · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: How many ministries is too many? Will A report out
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: today says we have way too many. The New Zealand
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Initiative reckons we could easily cut over twenty departments and
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: actually make our bureaucracy run smoother. So Flur Fitzimons is
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: the PSA National Secretary, and she joins me. Now, Helloflur,
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Then we go his first Sorry, the buttons wasn't working
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: very well.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Hello Flur, good morning.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: So we got eighty one ministerial portfolios, twenty eight ministers,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: forty three departments, three times as many portfolios and nearly
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: twice as many departments as comparable countries like Ireland. Surely
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: this can be rationalized.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: Well, look, we don't object to the discussion about this,
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: but I think you have to understand that it's taking
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: place in a political context driven by the ACT Party.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: He David Seymour was very supportive of an earlier version
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: of this report, and he's been consistent in saying we
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: need to dismiss thousands more public servants and we need
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: to move towards models of privatization. Now, I don't think
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: that's going to find favor with New Zealanders, and I
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: think it would be very dangerous for the delivery of
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: public services. So there's a lot of red flags of
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: this report.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: Do you really think it's just ACT Party and the
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: ACT Party supporters that are a bit worried about the
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: bloated size of our public service? Don't you think it's
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: much more widespread.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Well, when you say bloater, let's look at some of
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: the proposals in this report. They, for example, suggest merging
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: the Cancer Control Agency into the Ministry of Health. In
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: New Zealand, we've had cancer advocates for years calling for
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: an agency to hold our health system to accounts. They
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: finally got it in the Cancer Control Agency. This report
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: doesn't look at the value of that agency, the history
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: of its creation, or the importance of its work. It
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: simply looks at numbers. Now, when you do that, when
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: it comes to something like public policy, it's actually very dangerous.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: But no, I don't think it's as simple as a numbers.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: Whereas the go to for advocates when they say we've
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: got to do something about cancer to or just automatically
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: say well, let's have another ministry, let's have another department,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: let's have another bureaucracy.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: Well, I don't want to downplay the work that those
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: patient advocates did in the frustration that they felt with
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: our health system when it came to getting decent cancer treatment.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: But it's not just those patient advocates. So if you
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: look at what happens in New Zealand where we have
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: a disaster or a significant event that we need to investigate,
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: we set up a Royal commission, so Pipe River, abuse
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: in state care, the christ Church terrorist attack. Now those
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: commissions look carefully at what went wrong that led to
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: these disasters and how we could do better. If you
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: look at the recommendations of those commissions, none of them
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: say less public services or less investment in public services.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: They all say we need to do more, we need
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: to look more carefully. Here's how we need to set
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: up our public policy administration in New Zealand.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Let's just take the money out of it. Let's take
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: the advocacy out of it. But doesn't the amount of
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: bureaucrats we currently have just lead to confusion and are
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: slowing down of our public service. For instance, MB currently
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: answers to twenty different ministers. That's confusing.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: Well, actually, that's the kind of consolidation that this report's
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: asking for. More of so if that's confusing, then the
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: reporter is itself confusing, and I think it is. It
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: actually just takes a numerica in that analysis and overlays
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: it onto public agencies. There's no proper assessment of the
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: importance of, for example, the work of the Ministry for women,
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: or the work of the Ministry for specific people, their history,
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: the role that they play. And I think it's just
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: too simplistic when you look at it that way.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: All right, flirt and I thank you so much for
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: your time today. Flurfit Simon says from the PSAG is
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: the National Secretary. For more from earlier edition with Ryan Bridge.
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: Listen live to News Talks it Be from five am weekdays,
• 3:49
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