A summary view of government cost recovery policies in Australia and New Zealand relating to the supply of public sector information

Researching administrative history is problematical. A trail of authoritative documents is often hard to find; and useful summaries can be difficult to organise, especially if source material is in paper formats in geographically dispersed locations. In the absence of documents, the reasons for particular decisions and the rationale underpinning particular policies can be confounded as key personnel advance in their professions and retire. The rationale for past decisions may be lost for practical purposes; and if an organisation’s memory of events is diminished, its learning through experience is also diminished. Publishing this document tries to avoid unnecessary duplication of effort by other researchers that need to venture into how policies of charging for public sector information have been justified. The author compiled this work within a somewhat limited time period and the work does not pretend to be a complete or comprehensive analysis of the issues.----- A significant part of the role of government is to provide a framework of legally-enforceable rights and obligations that can support individuals and non-government organisations in their lawful activities. Accordingly, claims that governments should be more ‘business-like’ need careful scrutiny. A significant supply of goods and services occurs as non-market activity where neither benefits nor costs are quantified within conventional accounting systems or in terms of money. Where a government decides to provide information as a service; and information from land registries is archetypical, the transactions occur as a political decision made under a direct or a clearly delegated authority of a parliament with the requisite constitutional powers. This is not a market transaction and the language of the market confuses attempts to describe a number of aspects of how governments allocate resources.----- Cost recovery can be construed as an aspect of taxation that is a sole prerogative of a parliament. The issues are fundamental to political constitutions; but they become more complicated where states cede some taxing powers to a central government as part of a federal system. Nor should the absence of markets be construed necessarily as ‘market failure’ or even ‘government failure’. The absence is often attributable to particular technical, economic and political constraints that preclude the operation of markets. Arguably, greater care is needed in distinguishing between the polity and markets in raising revenues and allocating resources; and that needs to start by removing unhelpful references to ‘business’ in the context of government decision-making.

Re-visioning the Queensland Youth Sector : principles to inform the Queensland Government's youth strategy and review process

This discussion paper has been provided to assist the Department of Communities, Child Safety and Disability Services (DOCCSDS) in developing the Queensland Government’s Youth Strategy and inform the review of state government funded youth services. The paper lists a number of key concepts and social determinants which need to be considered in this undertaking. Additionally, it proposes a number key concepts and principles pertinent to understanding and working with young people, and for quality youth service provision.

Making usability affordable in the design of e-government services: User-centred design for public sector websites

E-government provides a platform for governments to implement web-enabled services that facilitate communication between citizens and the government. However, technology-driven design approach and limited understanding of citizens' requirements have led to a number of critical usability problems on the government websites. Hitherto, there has been no systematic attempt to analyse the way in which theory of User-Centred Design (UCD) can contribute to address the usability issues of government websites. This research seeks to fill this gap by synthesising perspectives drawn from the study of UCD and examining them based on the empirical data derived from case study of the Scottish Executive (SE) website. The research employs a qualitative approach in the collection and analysis of data. The triangulated analysis of the findings reveals that e-government web designers take commercial development approach and focus only on technical implementations, which lead to websites that do not meet citizens' expectations. The research identifies that e-government practitioners can overcome web usability issues by transferring the theory of UCD to practice. © Copyright 2010 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

Turbocharging Networks in the Public Sector

Networks have come to occupy a key position in the strategic armoury of the government, business and community sectors and now have impact on a broad array of policy and management arenas. An emphasis on relationships, trust and mutuality mean that networks function on a different operating logic to the conventional processes of government and business. It is therefore important that organizational members of networks are able to adopt the skills and culture necessary to operate successfully under these distinctive kinds of arrangements. Because networks function from a different operational logic to traditional bureaucracies, public sector organizations may experience difficulties in adapting to networked arrangements. Networks are formed to address a variety of social problems or meet capability gaps within organizations. As such they are often under pressure to quickly produce measurable outcomes and need to form rapidly and come to full operation quickly. This paper presents a theoretical exploration of how diverse types of networks are required for different management and policy situations and draws on a set of public sector case studies to understand/demonstrate how these various types of networked arrangements may be ‘turbo-charged’ so that they more quickly adopt the characteristics necessary to deliver required outcomes.

Performance measurement and feedback in a public sector program

Establishing a framework for measuring the performance of public sector programs is fraught with dangers. Many public sector organisations are satisfied with measuring activity in programs and fail to see the need for establishing a framework that will meet the needs of participants and measure outcomes as well as activities. This paper explores how a government department in Queensland went about establishing a performance management framework to measure the outcomes and activities in a program that was a public private partnership. Findings indicate that using an iterative consultative approach performance measure can be put in place that are meaningful and assist the participants to review the program.

Staking a claim : the role of stakeholders in government

The stakeholder approach which emerged under the auspices of new public management has been in use in public agencies for the past 25 years. However it remains a difficult and demanding task for agencies to determine who their stakeholders are and how to optimise interactions with them. This paper will examine how government agencies identify, classify and engage with stakeholders who have competing demands, differing access to resources and the ability to exert political pressure. To do this, the stakeholder approaches of nine agencies at three levels of government in Queensland were studied. The contribution of this paper is the development of a Stakeholder Classification Model for Public Agencies which could be used to create more focused and relevant stakeholder interventions.

Impeding good governance implementation in Indonesian regional government : the effect of a bureaucratic generation gap

The implementation of ‘good governance’ in Indonesia’s regional government sector became a central tenet in governance research following the introduction of the national code for governance in 2006. The code was originally drafted in 1999 as a response to the Asian financial crises and many cases of unearthed corruption, collusion, and nepotism. It was reviewed in 2001 and again in 2006 to incorporate relevant political, economical, and social developments. Even though the national code exists along with many regional government decrees on good governance, the extent of implementation of the tenets of good governance in Indonesia’s regional government is still questioned. Previous research on good governance implementation in Indonesian regional government (Mardiasmo, Barnes and Sakurai, 2008) identified differences in the nature and depth of implementation between various Indonesian regional governments. This paper analyses and extends this recent work and explores key factors that may impede the implementation and sustained application of governance practices across regional settings. The bureaucratic culture of Indonesian regional government is one that has been shaped for over approximately 30 years, in particular during that of the Soeharto regime. Previous research on this regime suggests a bureaucratic culture with a mix of positive and negative aspects. On one hand Soeharto’s regime resulted in strong development growth and strong economic fundamentals, resulting in Indonesia being recognised as one of the Asian economic tigers prior to the 1997 Asian financial crises. The financial crises however revealed a bureaucratic culture that was rife with corruption, collusion, and nepotism. Although subsequent Indonesian governments have been committed to eradicating entrenched practices it seems apparent that the culture is ingrained within the bureaucracy and eradication of it will take time. Informants from regional government agree with this observation, as they identify good governance as an innovative mechanism and to implement it will mean a deviation from the “old ways.” Thus there is a need for a “changed” mind set in order to implement sustained governance practices. Such an exercise has proven to be challenging so far, as there is “hidden” resistance from within the bureaucracy to change its ways. The inertia of such bureaucratic cultures forms a tension against the opportunity for the implementation of good governance. From this context an emergent finding is the existence of a ‘bureaucratic generation gap’ as an impeding variable to enhanced and more efficient implementation of governance systems. It was found that after the Asian financial crises the Indonesian government (both at national and regional level) drew upon a wider human resources pool to fill government positions – including entrants from academia, the private sector, international institutions, foreign nationals and new graduates. It suggested that this change in human capital within government is at the core of this ‘inter-generational divide.’ This divergence is exemplified, at one extreme, by [older] bureaucrats who have been in-position for long periods of time serving during the extended Soeharto regime. The “new” bureaucrats have only sat in their positions since the end of Asian financial crisis and did not serve during Soeharto’s regime. It is argued that the existence of this generation gap and associated aspects of organisational culture have significantly impeded modernising governance practices across regional Indonesia. This paper examines the experiences of government employees in five Indonesian regions: Solok, Padang, Gorontalo, Bali, and Jakarta. Each regional government is examined using a mixed methodology comprising of on-site observation, document analysis, and iterative semi-structured interviewing. Drawing from the experiences of five regional governments in implementing good governance this paper seeks to better understand the causal contexts of variable implementation governance practices and to suggest enhancements to the development of policies for sustainable inter-generational change in governance practice across regional government settings.

Economic issues in funding and supplying public sector information

In May 2005, a research team began to investigate whether designing and implementing a whole-of-government information licensing framework was possible. This framework was needed to administer copyright in relation to information produced by the government and to deal properly with privately-owned copyright on which government works often rely. The outcome so far is the design of the Government Information Licensing Framework (GILF) and its gradual uptake within a number of Commonwealth and State government agencies. However, licensing is part of a larger issue in managing public sector information (PSI); and it has important parallels with the management of libraries and public archives. Among other things, managing the retention and supply of PSI requires an ability to search and locate information, ability to give public access to the information legally, and an ability to administer charges for supplying information wherever it is required by law. The aim here is to provide a summary overview of pricing principles as they relate to the supply of PSI.

Contracting for community development : a case study based perspective of a public sector client initiative in Hong Kong

The construction industry is known to be an important contributor towards the gross domestic product of many countries. Moreover, the health of the construction industry is positively correlated to the economic growth of a country and in many economies public sector clients account for a major share of construction works. Given this strength, it is important for public sector clients to initiate innovations aimed at the betterment of the industry. In this context, concern about sustainable development has been a major driver of some innovative initiatives in construction industries worldwide. Furthermore, the Government of Hong Kong regards both sustainability and community development as important criteria when planning and procuring construction projects. This paper is based on a case study of a public sector development project in Hong Kong, and presents the salient features of the procurement and contractual systems adopted in the project, which foster sustainability and community development. The reported interim findings are based on a preliminary document analysis that is part of an ongoing longitudinal case study into the project. The document analysis takes a three-pronged approach in terms of how the procurement and contractual systems foster economic, environmental and social sustainability, and sums up their impact on the community as a whole.

Report to the Government 2.0 Taskforce : Project 4 - Copyright Law and Intellectual Property

This report is the primary output of Project 4: Copyright and Intellectual Property, the aim of which was to produce a report considering how greater access to and use of government information could be achieved within the scope of the current copyright law. In our submission for Project 4, we undertook to address: •the policy rationales underlying copyright and how they apply in the context of materials owned, held and used by government; • the recommendations of the Copyright Law Review Committee (CLRC) in its 2005 report on Crown copyright; • the legislative and regulatory barriers to information sharing in key domains, including where legal impediments such as copyright have been relied upon (whether rightly or wrongly) to justify a refusal to provide access to government data; • copyright licensing models appropriate to government materials and examples of licensing initiatives in Australia and other relevant jurisdictions; and • issues specific to the galleries, libraries, archives and museums (“GLAM”) sector, including management of copyright in legacy materials and “orphan” works. In addressing these areas, we analysed the submissions received in response to the Government 2.0 Taskforce Issues Paper, consulted with members of the Task Force as well as several key stakeholders and considered the comments posted on the Task Force’s blog. This Project Report sets out our findings on the above issues. It puts forward recommendations for consideration by the Government 2.0 Task Force on steps that can be taken to ensure that copyright and intellectual property promote access to and use of government information.