Senator CAMPBELL (3.56 p.m.) —I was a member of the Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration that produced this report. I think for all committee members, under Senator Coates's excellent chairmanship—and also with the addition of my leader, Senator Hill, and the foreign affairs spokesmen for the Democrats, Senator Bourne, who sat in on most of the hearings—it was certainly a wide ranging inquiry. It was a complex inquiry for those of us who had our first look inside the halls of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, both from an organisational point of view and indeed, on one occasion, on a physical visit to the building which, of course, will become redundant to the requirements of DFAT in a few years time when Gareth's gazebo is completed at York Park.   On a very quick reading of the government's response to this committee report, I have the same sort of feeling that has been expressed by my leader Senator Hill, and in probably slightly less critical terms by Senator Coates. Our criticisms seem to be in line with many of the responses we got from the senior management of DFAT while we were taking evidence. They were: we do not really think we should be looked into; everything is okay; there are a few problems but we are trying to fix them up; any morale problem—as Senator Hill said—was caused by the changes and by public sector reform.

  I got the overwhelming feeling throughout the entire quite lengthy inquiry that everything was okay and whenever there was what seemed be a very serious problem to solve, DFAT had a self-healing mechanism that quickly covered up the crack and put plaster in it. It is very hard to pin that fact down, but I suggest it is best summed up by the words `the more things change, the more they stay the same'. I suspect that is the case with DFAT. I am not particularly happy with the government's response even though it has agreed to some of the recommendations.

  One of the issues that I think is very important in a agency like DFAT, which has a policy and political role in large measure, except for the trade aspects of the department, is that it is probably very hard to keep people focused on the target. It is an unusual organisational challenge to keep morale high, to keep people focused and to reward excellence, so promotions and industrial relations problems do come to the surface quite regularly. As Senator Hill said, under the current minister, Senator Gareth Evans, we have had an enormous number of leaks; we have had industrial trouble and problems that have not occurred there before. We can all speculate as the reasons for that. We can only hope, however, that the Senate committee's inquiry and the report will, in some small way, assist in overcoming those problems. I am dubious as to whether that will take place.

  I am also dubious about whether or not shifting out of the old DFAT building—I think staff affectionately call it the Kremlin—across to the $200 million Gareth's gazebo building at York Park will do much to improve morale. One of the sad things about that proposal—we will probably hear a lot about this in the next couple of years, and I am sure it will not make the Minister for Foreign Affairs very happy—is that there is an overcrowding problem at the Kremlin, but the building at York Park is being built on a site which allows for absolutely no future expansion and which will house almost the identical number of people as are housed in the old building.

  I think the Department of Foreign Affairs has made a fundamentally stupid property decision. In the long run—even though people will have a good, happy feeling when they move into the new building and get their new desks and chairs, if the department can actually afford to carpet the place—the morale problems will not be assisted by what should have otherwise been a positive move. The decision making processes within the department are controlled by a group of people with an unusual set of incentives. I say no more than that.

  It is very hard to solve those industrial relations problems and those morale problems when the promotion and industrial relations systems within the department are so tightly controlled and so bureaucratic. Again, they are tightly controlled by a small clique of people within that department. That is a fundamental problem which was very hard for our committee to address, even though I think all members of our committee regarded it as real.

  I was very surprised to see that the Public Sector Union had a full time officer on the full time payroll of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. To me that was an unusual arrangement. I still have grave reservations about the taxpayer funding a full time trade union shop steward on the floor of a government department. I am sure many taxpayers in Australia would respect the right of a trade union to organise public service officers and to represent their interests, but I also think many taxpayers would be very suspect about the taxpayer paying the salary of that shop steward within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. I doubt whether workplace relations within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade can be progressed and improved by having the public sector representative on the payroll of the management of DFAT. That is the problem I think we have to face.

  I conclude my remarks by saying that I am disappointed by the government's response. I was disappointed generally with the whole way in which our inquiry was approached within DFAT. In many ways it was a let down to the very many highly professional, dedicated people—many of whom are friends of mine—who work within the Department of Foreign Affairs in the very best interests of Australia's international and national interests. As Senator Robert Hill said earlier, the DFAT staff dedicate themselves, under trying industrial workplace conditions, to the job of furthering Australia's interests—a job that goes unrecognised by many Australians.

  Debate (on motion by Senator Panizza) adjourned.