Clerk of the House David Wilson, making an oral submission to the Governance and Administration Committee on the Public Service Amendment Bill, on Wednesday. Photo: VNP/Louis Collins
Parliament's Governance and Administration Committee heard submissions on the Public Service Amendment Bill this week, a piece of legislation that might sound tedious but actually introduces some significant and somewhat controversial changes.
Legislation to change how the public service operates rarely makes headlines. Reform in this area is sometimes dismissed as another reshuffling of the bureaucratic furniture.
The bill falls under the government's broader push to focus the public service on what it calls "back to basics", a recurring slogan underpinning law changes across several sectors.
The most notable and indeed politically divisive change in the bill relates to DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion), a concept increasingly under attack, especially in the United States. The new bill makes a number of changes, including removing the expectation that the public service should 'reflect the communities it serves'. Removing diversity provisions in favour of entirely merit-based appointments was a coalition agreement between National and New Zealand First.
The bulk of submissions on the bill focused on its DEI provisions (or rather, the removal of them). One submission on Wednesday morning, from Clerk of the House David Wilson, was about something completely different.
Wilson expressed concerns about proposed changes to the process around Long-term Insights Briefings.
Long-term Insights Briefings are an initiative introduced by the previous government (which have occurred once so far), requiring each government department to produce a triennial analysis of future trends, risks and opportunities. Each briefing goes to the relevant minister, who was obliged to table them in Parliament. Select Committees would then follow up, which might prove uncomfortable.
The briefings are intended to enhance long-term thinking on issues and help Parliament scrutinise government priorities more effectively. Departments writing briefings were also able to set out the "strengths and weaknesses of policy options" (though not opt for favourites).
Under the proposed changes just one briefing would be written in future and it would come from the Prime Minister's own team, and go to the Prime Minister.
Wilson identified this as a weakness, saying "the bill that is in front of the committee proposes that only the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet will prepare a long-term insight briefing in the future, and I raise that because it directly affects Parliament's ability to scrutinise the performance of the Government and of public service departments."
"At the moment, there's one of these briefings per department. They're allocated to committees, almost all committees get one. So I guess the concern is that it reduces the ability of committees, as a whole, to carry out some of that long-term scrutiny and to scrutinise government performance. But on the other hand, I do take the point from the briefing papers and the regulatory impact statement around the need for better coordination and leadership of it by the DPMC (Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet)."
Wilson suggested that rather than scrapping the initiative, departments should retain the obligation to prepare Long Term Insights Briefings for their own subject areas, with the DPMC being empowered to coordinate the process more effectively. Currently departments can choose to collaborate.
It's not unusual for the Clerk to provide feedback on bills or select committee work, especially in regards to bills affecting Parliament. As well as providing an administrative service, the Clerk's second core role is to advise MPs on parliamentary procedure and legal matters. Sometimes that entails making suggestions on legislation that impacts the functioning of the legislature.
With added scrutiny responsibilities, and submissions on bills vastly increasing in number, Wilson has previously expressed concern that the Office of the Clerk may struggle with a potential "new norm" of an unmanageable workload.
In Wednesday's hearing, National MP Tim Costley appeared to raise an objection to the Clerk spending time on advising committees regarding legislation.
National's Tim Costley, during a select committee (file photo) Photo: VNP / Phil Smith
"I've noticed that, you know, the Office of the Clerk has submitted on a few bills. At the same time, we're being told that committees can't be supported with more fulsome reports when they actually conduct scrutiny in terms of annual reviews and estimates because of time, and yet, I guess some of us sit here and go, well, the Office has got time to make commentary on bills and policy recommendations. Could that not be dedicated to the helping [of] actual scrutiny?"
Parliament's Clerk role has a long history of commenting on and recommending changes to bills that affect Parliament, and Wilson made this clear to Costley, adding that the amount of time and resource that are used contributing to the legislative process is a minor fraction of the time and resource needed to support select committees.
"I certainly would like to be able to provide greater support to committees, and I hope that with the passage of the Parliament Bill we'll be able to, but I think we'd be missing an opportunity if I didn't carry out my role in commenting on legislation that affects Parliament. All I'm highlighting is that a report that would come to each committee, that actually focuses on those areas in their subject area, will no longer be available. I think there's a way of achieving what the government wants to, but also something that's still useful for Parliament," Wilson said.
The Governance and Administration Committee will continue considering the Public Service Amendment Bill and is scheduled to report back to the House by 1 December.
You can listen to the audio version of this story by clicking the link near the top of the page.
RNZ's The House, with insights into Parliament, legislation and issues, is made with funding from Parliament's Office of the Clerk.
