The Westminster Tradition

The starter's gun has gone on Australia's national elections for 2025 and Parliament has been prorogued.

In this episode, former head of Cabinet Office and keeper of the Caretaker Conventions, Alison answers Caroline and Danielle's increasingly pointed questions, and we end with arguing about the importance of formatting.

Stay tuned to the end for some fabulous insider advice for managing caretaker period and elections...

Drawing on overwhelming feedback from our listeners, in this episode we unpack the experience of being recruited into the public sector (or ghosted along the way). 

Danielle takes us through

• What goes in Role Descriptions (hint: it shouldn't be slabs of legislation)
• The madness of defined requirements like 'driving' and 'interstate travel' (and whether Caroline's sister can really change a tyre)
• Alison...

How did the abuse at Oakden remain hidden for so long? And what finally brought it to light?

In this episode we discuss:

• why families might not complain
• how small, isolated outposts can hide terrible things
• the importance of following up on things that don’t feel quite right.

Intro grab from the RN Background Briefing episode A Failure to Care: The Oakden Nursing Home, featuring Lorraine Baff, whose father was a patient at Oakd...

In light of this week's decision that the NACC will pursue investigations into six public officials, we thought we would repost this episode from December 2024 explaining why the NACC's original decision to take no further action needed to be revisited, with a little explainer up front on the latest news.

You can find out more about the NACC's announcement on 18th February 2025 here.

In this episode, we talk about wher...

For over a decade, the state government vacillated about whether or not to privatise the Oakden Older Persons Mental Health Facility.

Once the 2007 accreditation crisis had passed, however, it never reached the top of the ‘to do’ list. Meanwhile, investment in facilities and staffing were endlessly postponed pending a decision. 

In this episode, we discuss:

• the dangers of decay while waiting for strategic directions
• whether an orga...

We return for 2025 with a series on the Oakden Older Persons Mental Health Facility, an SA Government run facility whose scandalous conditions and institutionalised elder abuse were exposed in 2017, prompting (among other things) a Commonwealth Royal Commission. 

In this episode, we unpack a missed opportunity in 2007 to move Oakden from a mid-twentieth century asylum to a modern aged care facility, when the facility failed Commonwe...

What do Secretaries really think when junior staff ask for career advice? Why are silos so impermeable? And should Christmas really be cancelled? Join Danielle and Caroline as they take Mike through listener questions.

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research as busy full time jobs and lives allow, we definitely don’t guarantee that we’ve got all the detai...

Mike Kaiser, recently departed head of the Queensland Public Service, joins us to chat about the interface between political offices and the public service, lessons from robodebt, why delivery is everything in government and the secret of leadership. 

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research as busy full time jobs and lives allow, we definitely don’t guara...

Danielle unpacks the recently released APS State of the Service, with a look over our should at where we’ve come from - from the 1976 Coombs Royal Commission on Australian Government Administration, to the 2019 Thodey Review of the APS. 

How are women, First Nations and people with disability going in the APS? What about class?

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as tho...

Keeping track of the National Anti-Corruption Commission and Robodebt is tricky - first there's no investigation, then there's some kind of review, then there's a search for an eminent person....

In this episode, we talk about where things are at, managing conflicts of interest, and whether corruption always involves brown paper bags.

For Rick Morton's reporting on this:

• Eight minutes outsid...

Post Office’s internal inquiries never got to the bottom of the situation. Here we unpack how to choose an investigator, getting the information to the person, and what do with a report.

Opening grab from Sir Anthony Hooper, independent chair of Horizon mediation scheme.

Subsequent grab from Mr Beer KC and Paula Vennels, former Post Office Limited Chief Executive.

Subsequent grab Mr Beer KC and Alice Per...

Post Office leadership commissioned at least 6 different investigations of varying degrees of independence and rigor into complaints about Horizon after 2010. And yet none of them got to the truth. In the next two episodes, we unpack what not to do when setting up inquiries and investigations.

Opening grab from Mr Beer KC and Alice Perkins, former Post Office Limited Chair.

Subsequent grab from Mr Beer KC and Ali...

Another great round of questions, thanks!

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research as busy full time jobs and lives allow, we definitely don’t guarantee that we’ve got all the details right.

If you want rigorous reporting on Robodebt, we recommend the work of Rick Morton at the Saturday Paper, Chris Knaus and Luke Henriques-Gomes at the Guardian, ...

Thanks for the questions folks!

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research as busy full time jobs and lives allow, we definitely don’t guarantee that we’ve got all the details right.

If you want rigorous reporting on Robodebt, we recommend the work of Rick Morton at the Saturday Paper, Chris Knaus and Luke Henriques-Gomes at the Guardian, Ben Eltham...

The Australian Public Service Commission has released the findings of its Centralised Code of Conduct Inquiry into Robodebt.

Outro grab from The West Wing, Season 3, Episode 10.

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research as busy full time jobs and lives allow, we definitely don’t guarantee that we’ve got all the details right.

If you want r...

In this episode, we look at why Post Office kept prosecuting Sub Post Masters through the lens of Dan Davies' analysis in his new book The Unaccountability Machine.

Opening grab from Mr Beer KC (Counsel Assisting) and Alisdair Cameron, CFO and former interim CE of Post Office Ltd.

Subsequent grab from Mr Blake KC (Counsel Assisting) and Graham Brander, former Post Office Investigator.

Subsequent grab...

A massive power imbalance, everyone doing the narrowest version of their jobs, and an overriding culture that assumed postmasters were thieves. These are just some of the ways Post Office ended up prosecuting postmasters for shortfalls that existed only on the computer.

Opening grab from Mr Beer KC (Counsel Assisting) and Rob Wilson, former Head of the Royal Mail Group Criminal Law Team.

Subsequent grab from Mr Be...

Now for some appropriately bureaucratic disclaimers....

While we have tried to be as thorough in our research ...

• The pros and cons of bringing all service delivery together in a single agency 
• The valuing of operational expertise v policy leadership
• The role of portfolio budget practices in driving Robodebt
• Cultures of challenge and diversity of thought
• The future of public se...