The future public sector
John Hartevelt in the Dom Post:
Government departments are about to start disappearing, the head of the public service says.
State Services commissioner Iain Rennie said the structure of the entire public service would be changed within five years.
Excellent. I believe the future is fewer ministries, but they will be sector-wide. In hindsight National got it wrong in the 1990s when they split ministries into smaller agencies, and Labour were on the right track with amalgamations. That way you avoid having duplicate IT systems, HR finance systems systems etc.
My future state sector would be:
- Ministry of Internal Security – Crown Law, Corrections, SIS, Justice, SFO, Police
- Ministry for Environment – Environment, EPA, Conservation, Biosecurity
- Dept of Administrative Affairs – DIA, LINZ, Building & Housing, Customs, Stats
- Ministry for Economic Development – Labour, MAF, MED, Fisheries, MORST, Transport
- DPMC – DPMC, SSC
- Education – Education, ERO, TEC
- Ministry of External Relations & Security – GCSB, Defence, MFAT, NZDF
- Treasury – Treasury
- Incomes – IRD, WINZ
- Culture – Culture & Heritage, Nat Lib, Archives, NZ on Air
- Health – Health
- Social Policy – Pacific Island Affairs, MSD, CYF, Youth Development, Community Sector, Senior Citizens, Families, Women’s Affairs, TPK
- Parliament – Parl Serv, Min Serv, Office of Clerk, PCO
This means you could have a cabinet of 12. The Speaker looks after Parliament, and one Minister per major agency. One could have associate ministers outside cabinet who get delegated some of the specialist areas within an overall portfolio.