A newly-widened parliamentary probe into the Australian Public Service’s (APS) expanding catalogue of technology project failures and blowouts is set to re-ignite debate about the bureaucracy’s ongoing difficulties in attracting and retaining digital talent — and whether insufficient pay and lack of career path is a major deterrent.
With the future of a raft of major IT projects across agencies, ranging from Services Australia to the Australian Securities Investments Commission and Home Affairs being still largely unclear, the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit (JCPAA) has quietly roped in APS tech skills as a target for scrutiny, including current professional and specialist categorisations.
Less than two weeks ago the JCPAA significantly widened the scope of its initial inquiry into the Department of Home Affairs’ $92 million failed attempt to outsource visa processing to also “consider other IT procurement processes across the public sector”, including interrogating a laundry list of highly critical audits from across the APS.
But the new terms of reference also reveal public service technology skills will be a key focus, with “the role of the Australian Public Service Digital Profession in building the digital capability of public sector entities into the future” now listed as a specific topic for inquiry.
The inclusion of the so-called “Digital Profession” for examination as a specific item is a major development because it will test, and put into evidence, the positions of agency leadership and the issues they are facing in completing tech projects, especially amid policies seeking to limit the use of contractors and consultants in favour of recruiting permanent public servants.
Back to the Future Part II
The Digital Transformation Agency had previously submitted to the Australian Public Service Commission’s APS Hierarchy and Classification Review (which sprang from the Thodey review of the APS) that a new and distinct “Specialist” employment category was needed in the APS that could sit outside what are essentially clerical classifications.
But the bid was firmly rejected by the hierarchy review, which instead doubled down on homogenising job roles and standardising them so they are consistent across the government.
A major public service headache is that, even for contractors, agencies are routinely being forced to push up the classification of digital and IT roles just to even come close to the market in terms of competitive remuneration.
A year ago, a senate estimates committee was told that IT contractors at Services Australia were costing $1,300 per day for roles that sat at the APS 5/6 level, putting the hired help on an effective annual salary of $280,000-$300,000.
The disclosure by Services Australia pegged the APS vs real-world market pay gap at around $100,000 for IT skills that the public service is increasingly in need of.
Since then, the government has committed even harder to its insourcing agenda off the back of the Big Four consultancies scandal, with major departments like Defence putting a two-year moratorium on public servants who resign to go private industry returning as contractors and consultants.
Finger-pointing over digital deals
Tech and specialist skills in the APS remain a lightning-rod issue across both agencies and ministries because the Albanese government is now moving out of the phase where it can sheet blame for major problems with projects back to the opposition, and into the phase when its own performance on fixing them comes into focus.
The issue of APS tech skills pay flared just last week at the Australian Public Service Commission’s State of the Service Roadshow in Canberra, with both politicians and department heads put on the spot.
A clear target of the JCPAA extending its tech probe is how major IT project deals were done under the last government, a move likely to produce decent political results, but not necessarily solutions.
A key development over the past few years is that the government’s efforts through the bargaining process to impose a standardised set of pay scales and conditions across both APS and non-APS agencies have prompted industrial action from both large trades unions and specialist employee representatives.
A key source of anger is that many government employees are being left behind on pay when they often do not get conditions like working from home.
The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) has already made a submission to the JCPAA tech projects inquiry; however, this was written and lodged prior to the terms reference being expanded.
It is understood a number of stakeholders held off making submissions until they could see the widened terms of reference. The Australian Public Service Commission has told The Mandarin it intends to make a submission.
Casting call
The CPSU submission argues strongly for insourcing APS IT, including the union’s proposal to bring a visa processing upgrade in-house, and takes strong issue with the IT procurement processes at Home Affairs that the JCPAA is looking into.
“During the tender process it came to light that one of the tendering consortiums, Australian Visa Processing (APV) Consortium, was led by Scott Briggs who was a Liberal Party official, and close personal associate of then Prime Minister Scott Morrison and then Immigration Minister David Coleman,” the CPSU submission says.
“Subsequent to the exposure of this connection both the then Prime Minister and Immigration Minister were forced to recuse themselves from the process. Mr Briggs also eventually removed himself from the process.
“The revelations this year regarding the personal relationship and communication between the then Secretary of the Department of Home Affairs, Mike Pezzulo and Mr Briggs, raise further questions about the tender process.”
Insert coin to continue
On the issue of APS pay, and its ability to attract talent, the CPSU submission says this:
“The Government should preference work being performed in-house and invest in supporting in-house capacity. This includes appropriate staffing levels, support and training, as well as ensuring that pay and conditions are competitive, and the APS can attract and retain specialised staff.
“To ensure appropriate development of in-house capacity there should be a review of the current dependencies on the market to deliver.”
However previous submissions to the 2019 Thodey review of the APS have already illuminated what some of those issues are, with one anonymous public servant in Defence then neatly summarising the problems that persist today.
“An example of the impact of being no longer being an ‘employer of choice’ is highlighted by my Division’s experience in trying to recruit technical employees. It is very hard to recruit and engage skilled technical people and one example is an attempt by my work area which recently advertised a technical position and received only two suitable applications and the successful applicant then declined the position,” the Defence staffer said.
“I understand this to be partly related to the overly simplistic classification system, which leaves no room for differentiation or recognition of areas requiring specialist skills in order to compete with market rates. The one scheme within Defence that is intended to cater for this need is so difficult to access, and requires annual re-justification, creating further administrative burden, that it has become effectively unworkable.
“This in turn has led to a hollowing out of technical skills within the APS, which are essential for delivering Defence’s technical projects and procurements. Skilled, capable engineers and technicians are necessary to determine the technical requirements and oversee industry contractors to ensure the delivery of projects that are fit for purpose and provide value for money to the Commonwealth,” the Defence staffer continues.
“Without Commonwealth employees skilled in these and other areas, the risk increases significantly of contractors misunderstanding or failing to fully deliver Defence’s requirements (or Defence failing to accurately identify the requirements), resulting in poor value for money, or delayed delivery/implementation, which in some cases can have direct impact to serving men and women in harm’s way.”
And that submission was written prior to AUKUS.
Did somebody say KFC?
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Poor pay for in-house tech staff bites APS chiefs in real-time
