public sector reform in australia and its impact on libraries

Intl. Inform. & Libr. Reo. (1995) 27, 359-373

Public Sector Reform in Australia and its Impact on Libraries

P A T R I C I A W I L L A R D *

ABSTRACT

The Australian public sector, like that in many other countries, has been undergoing substantial reform for more than a decade. The changes, which have been introduced as ways of improving efficiency, effectiveness and accountability, have affected all areas ofgovernment operations. The methods for achieving the improvements have involved substantial change in respect of financial management, goal setting and evaluation, structural change and human resource management policies. Occurring concurrently with change within the public sector, the Aus- tralian Commonwealth and various state governments have been pursuing substantial change programs in other areas, such as industrial relations, which have had many similar aims to those of the government reform programs, a major one being the improvement of efficiency and effectiveness in the workplace. Libraries have felt, and will continue to feel, the impacts of these reforms as new management requirements and methods are introduced. This paper briefly describes a number of aspects of the various reform programs highlighting their impacts to date and some of their likely future impacts on the librarian and the library workplace. © 1995 Academic Press Limited

INTRODUCTION

Much has been written about the impacts of new information technology on the library, the librarian and other library staff. Less has been written about impacts of changing management contexts though these undoubt -~ edly have the potential to result in substantial change, even library closure. Over the past decade or so, the Australian public sector, the focus o f this article, has undergone substantial change i n m a n a g e m e n t practices with the reform programs driving these changes directed by the wish to improve

* Senior Lecturer, School of Information, Library and Archive Studies, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.

1057-2317/95/040359+15 $12.00/0 © 1995 Academic Press Limited

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efficiency, effectiveness and accountability, i The reforms have been across all aspects of public sector organizations--structure, financial management, commercial practices, planning and reporting, human resources management and industrial relations--and their breadth and subsequent impacts have led to them being described as a public sector "cultural revolution". 2

This paper provides an overview of a number of the reforms, how they relate to each other and their workplace impacts, with particular attention to the library workplace. The public sector is a major employer of library and information personnel in Australia, hence changes in government organizations' management practices have an impact on a large number of practising librarians. The focus is the Commonwealth Government and the Australian Public Service (APS) that is under its jurisdiction. In addition to its own reform program, the Commonwealth Government has sought to encourage more widespread reform, hence brief attention will also be paid to state and local government to illustrate how change is occurring nationally. 3 Whilst similar management changes have occurred, and are still occurring nationally across the three government levels--Com- monwealth, state and local--the time of promulgation and content of legislation has varied as have implementation rates (a similar level of variability applies across libraries both between and within the various sectors). Even in areas of Commonwealth Government responsibility, the implementation speed has varied between and within departments. Regardless of these discrepancies, trends have been in the same general direction within, and across, the various government sectors regardless of the political party in power, for whilst there has been a Labor Com- monwealth Government since 1983, a number of state governments have changed along party political lines.

The reform process discussed below is not complete, not only because of variability in implementation but also due to changes in emphasis over time. More attention has been given in the last few years to public sector organizations developing a client-focus (with public expression in service charters) and subsequent evaluation placing greater importance on client satisfaction, whereas earlier reforms had relied more on analytical tech-

IDonald, O. (1993) Quality service standards and performance information. Canberra Bulletin of Public Administration 47, p. 1.

Yeatman, A. (1990) Bureaucrats, technocrats, femocrats: essays on the contemporary Australian state. Sydney. Allen & Unwin. 1990. p. 13.

s Public sector reform has also occurred at state level and while the Commonwealth Government has frequently led the reform agenda, it has not always been the first to introduce a particular reform, for example, New South Wales was the first jurisdiction to require the introduction of accrual accounting across all government operations [Allan, P. (1991) The Financial Management Improve- ment Program of the New South Wales Treasury. Australian Journal of Public Administration 50(2), p. 111].

PUBLIC S E C T O R R E F O R M IN A U S T R A L I A 361

niques such as program evaluation and cost-benefit analysis, to determine effectiveness. 4

This paper aims to provide a partial snapshot of the reform programs for it is not possible, in a single paper, to document and review the very substantial changes introduced into the various levels of government, or even the Commonwealth Government, the focus of this article. The reforms have generated a great deal of discussion in the Australian literature of public administration and beyond it. The author believes it is fair to say that while aspects of the reforms have been criticized, some quite substantially, much of the comment has also been that change was undoubtedly necessary and, perhaps more importantly, that a return to old ways and methods could not occur. There had been limited formal evaluation of the Commonwealth Government program prior to 1993, 5 when the Government commissioned an evaluation by its Management Advisory Board (MAB) and Management Improvement Advisory Com- mittee (MIAC) which produced a report slightly in excess of 600 pages. 6 The results, which review a diverse package of reforms, cannot be sum- marized in a paragraph or two, however the authors of the report make the following remarks:

"No-one would expect that an evaluation drawing upon such a diverse set of data and views should say only glowing things about management reform in a decade of enormous change or suggest that the need for further reform has ended. And indeed it does not. However, a return to the previous arrangements, even if possible, would not be desirable. The new framework has strong support and is seen, overall, to have increased the cost- effectiveness of the APS including outcomes for clients."

"Overall the evaluation concludes that the reforms as a whole have had a positive impact, although scope exists for improvement in implementation. Noting the limited evidence available about the actual impact of overseas reforms, the evaluation suggests that the APS is at very least on a par with progress elsewhere. ''7,s

There is not the space in this paper to discuss in detail the issues which have been raised by aspects of the change programs, many of which are not trivial. One which goes to the heart of the reform process concerns accountability--what it means in public service operations and to whom

4 Marsh, I. (1994) The changing ethos ofpublic service: guest editor's introduction. Australian Journal of Public Administration 53(3), p. 280.

5 Harman, E. (1993) The impact of pubfic sector reforms on Australian Government. In P. Weller, J. Forster and G. Davis (Eds) Reforming the public seroice: lessons from recent experience. South Melbourne, Macmillan Education, 1993.

6 Australia. Task Force on Management Improvement (1993) The Australian Public Service reformed" an evaluation of a decade of manngement reform. Canberra. Australian Government Publishing Service. 1993.

7 ibid. pp. 42--43. 8 While many countries have introduced changes along similar lines to the Australian ones over the

last decade or so, it is interesting to note that there have not been any accompanying systematic reviews.

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it is owed. Whose interest should be put first--elected government, the people using particular government services, the tax-payer? 9 Another important issue which has bedevilled the evaluative side of the change program, concerns the determination of what is value for resources expended, which can be difficult to assess when dealing with many government services. The view, referred to above, which seems to be favoured at present that client satisfaction determines value, is not without its own difficulties.

The types of changes discussed below are not limited to the public sector. Many similar initiatives have been introduced in the private, sector which has also felt the effects of economic recession, major indusuial relations reforms and the imperative of global competition. The latter has been a driving force in developing the rhetoric of the desirability of workplace change. The term "clever country", now established in the Australian vocabulary, was used in the mid-eighties by the then Prime Minister Robert Hawke to encourage change in national attitudes to work and work processes, presenting the idea that ways of doing things should change with people working "smarter not harder".~°

Public sector libraries have felt the effects of government management change programs directly through their associated budget cuts and departmental re-structuring and also through the various demands placed on the librarian that require new skills in many management areas. ~] This article is presented in the belief that an overview of the changes will be of interest in their own right but also because bringing them together provides an opportunity to consider the impacts of this type of management change program, a phenomenon not limited to Australia but occurring in many countries. 12

In addition to changes arising from public sector legislative and work practice reform, there have been also substantial changes in areas which have impacted on the Australian public sector workplace. One area, which will be returned to briefly, is industrial relations where changes in government policies are affecting the whole nation.

9 Improving accountability has been a major thrust behind many of the government reforms and as suggested in this paper, it is an issue which has been subject to debate. Reviewing this discourse is beyond this paper though the author acknowledges its importance.

t°Burnheim, R. (1993) Competency-based training curricula: technological challenges for library services. Australian Academiz and Research Libraries 24(4). p. 264-

t l The author knows of library closures and downsizings at Commonwealth and state levels following on from change in structure or financial pressures on parent bodies. There is a lack of local library literature dealing with specific reforms and their impacts though there have been quite a number of general articles which highlight the need to be responsive to clients, to market the library more effecfivdy, to make alliances with influential people etc.

'2Yeatman, A. (1994-) The reform of public management: an overview. Australian Journal of Public Administration 55(3), p. 287.

P U B L I C S E C T O R R E F O R M IN A U S T R A L I A 363

B A C K G R O U N D

In order to understand better the management reforms, a brief explanation of Australian government structure is necessary. There are three levels of elected government--Commonwealth, ~3 state and local. At the Com- monwealth and six-state levels there are two major political parties (in many policy areas not very different, but historically of labour and con- servative orientations) whilst at local level there are more independent representatives reflecting the importance of local issues. Each level has some discrete responsibilities and there is sharing in some areas, for example both state and Commonwealth governments have major responsibilities in health services.

The government sector is a major part of the national economy rep- resenting about one-third of Gross Domestic Product.14 The three levels collect revenue directly, at local government level in the form of land and property taxes, at state level in the form of various charges such as stamp duty on transactions and at Commonwealth level in a number of ways including income taxation. The Commonwealth government is the major collector of revenue, part of which is transferred to the states and to some selected local government projects. Similarly, some state monies are distributed to local government though how much and in what way varies between states. For example, the proportions of state and local government money supporting public libraries varies substantially between states depending on the way the provision of local public libraries has developed.

The Commonwealth government is able to influence the actiona of the other levels of government through both the amount of funds it transfers and by committing money to particular expenditures. It can also influence what happens at the other levels of government by passing national legislation (within the bounds set by the Constitution which protects some state rights) or by entering into agreements with national bodies as the Commonwealth Labor Government has with the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). This agreement, called the Accord, has been a significant factor in enabling many changes in industrial relations processes, for Australia has a well-developed trade union movement.15 In a similar way, a state government can be very influential on local govern-: ment for it has the power to introduce legislative changes affecting it. State

~3 Australia also has several internal and external Commonwealth territories which it is not necessary to describe for this paper.

~ Emy, H. (1992) Michael Pusey's economic rationalism in Canberra. Quadrant 34(7/8), p. 57. is The Australian trade unions have themselves undergone substantial reorganization over the past

decade or so resulting in some very large unions, and while still strong their membership, and hence power, has been decfining, a trend which it is believed is likely to continue [Byrt, W. (1990) Business and government in Australia. Melbourne. Macmillan. 1990. p. 67].

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governments also have influence because they allocate some funds to, and provide some infrastructure for, local government. All three levels of government are major employers.

It can be seen from this brief summary that each higher level of government can be influential over what is below it with the Commonwealth Government, having substantial power flowing from the Constitution and its legislative powers, and from its central position in collecting and allocating money. As all levels of government are subject to election at regular intervals, electorate opinion obviously must influence government action.

T H E M A N A G E M E N T R E F O R M P A C K A G E S

The genesis of the management reforms lie in changing views in Australia and in other liberal democratic countries about the operation of the public sector. 16 Australia experienced a change in Commonwealth Government in 1983 with the new Labor Government having as part of its electoral platform a policy to reform the machinery of government.17 Interest in reform had begun in the 1970's when there were a number of reviews on aspects of public administration and some legislative reform.'8 In addition, a climate emerged in the 1980's, epitomized by the views of the government of Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom, which favoured adopting management models and practices similar to those of the private sector. Also espoused was the desirability of government downsizing and pulling out of some areas of previous responsibility, and the introduction of cost- recovery or profit-making where possible. An additional force influencing the review of government sector management was the economic downturn experienced by Australia and many other Western economies during the late 1980's and into the 1990's. Hence a major motivation was the wish to cut both public expenditure and the number of public servants. However, the Australian reforms have never been presented as just economy drives but also as methods of improving efficiency, effectiveness and accountability.

Implementation of the Commonwealth Government reform process

JSYeatman, 1994, p. 287. J7 Australia (1983) Reforming the Australian Public Service: a statement of the Government's intentions, December,

1983. Canberra. Australian Government Publishing Service. 1983. is One very influential report published in 1976, which recommended change in structure and

methods, was that from a Royal Commission chaired by a distinguished former public servant, Dr Herbert Coombs (Australia. Royal Commission on Australian Government Administration. 1976. Report. Canberra. Australian Government Publishing Service, 1976).


began in April 1984 ~9 with the introduction of a program of resource management reforms (some of which were already in the process of implementation and others to come over the next couple of years) called the Financial Management Improvement Program (FMIP). 2° The scope of FMIP was much broader than the name suggests for it encompassed reforms in "the budgetary and regulatory framework, program management and budgeting (PMB), commercial practices, incentives and reporting mechanisms which include the provision of quality information on performance". 21 The impacts of these reforms reached right through the APS as they required government departments to strive to reach time deadlines (not always achieved) on specific aspects of the reforms with neither service defivery nor administrative support activities of departments exempted.

Innovations in financial management strategies included an expenditure control framework based on 3-year forward estimates which brought requirements of explicit forward planning into all areas of public sector organizations. 22 A related major component of this reform package was the requirement for government departments to structure their financial planning around programs which had clearly articulated purposes, realistic cost structures and specified performance targets which were to be regu- larly reported uponY Another change was the introduction in 1986 of the "efficiency dividend" (essentially productivity improvements) 24 whereby government departments have been required to reduce annually their running costs by a set percentage unless specifically exempted. 25 The requirement to reduce running costs while keeping up services pat some

19 Australia. House of Representatives Standing Committee on Finance and Administration (1990) Not dollars alone: review of the Financial Management Improvement Program, Canberra. Australian Government Publishing Service. 1990. p. 1.

20 Reform programs along lines similar to the Commonwealth program have been introduced by the various states, for example the New South Wales Government introduced a financial reform program which it called FMIP in N.S.W. Various state governments have also introduced changes in requirements for financial management, planning and evaluation by their local government. For example, New South Wales passed a new Local Government Act in 1993 which required management plans, performance targets, detailed financial plans and regular reporting (New South Wales. Parlia- ment, 1993).

21 Australia. House of Representatives Standing Committee on Finance and Administration (1990) p. 7.

2,. Australia. Task Force on Management Improvement, p. 16. 2Sibid. p. 19. 24Bunn, D. & Ranald, P. (1993) The employee perspective. In P. Weller, J. Forster and G. Davis

(Eds) Rej'brrn/ng the publk sen, ice: lessons from recent experience. Melbourne. Macmillan. 1993. p. 212, 25 The "efficiency dividend" has been the subject of ongoing criticism claiming i t can be a dis-

incentive to good performance and that its achievement can be very difficult for some departments (Australia. House of Representatives Standing Committee on Finance and Administration, p. xiv). The impression gained by the author is that there is a fairly widely held view that such savings have become increasingly ditficuh to achieve.

366 v. WILLARD

government departments under a great deal of pressure. Areas of a department such as a library, which could be seen as an overhead rather than a core service, were probably more vulnerable in this cost-cutting situation. Similarly, libraries which had not positioned themselves within their department to ensure their services were acknowledged by those with influence as contributing directly and valuably to achieving the department's goals, would also have been vulnerable.

A number of reforms are included under the rubric of commercial reforms including the "corporatizing" (which requires operation like a business and payment of a dividend to the government) of some goVern- ment business enterprises. 26 Within departments which have not been "corporatized" there has also been pressure to raise funds and to charge for services where possible and appropriate. In addition to charging out- siders for some services, internal (intra-departmental and inter-departmental) charging for services are now commonplace. A consequence of this is almost certainly a greater scrutiny of whether services are worth their cost and from a library's perspective the need to demonstrate that services represent value for money.

Charging for services is not the only way a commercial orientation has been introduced. Commercial reforms have also included the review of processes for government purchasing and a major shift has been to require the contracting of services to outside agencies (outsourcing) if this is ident- ified as cost-effective. The impact of this on some Commonwealth Govern- ment department libraries has been the outsourcing of technical services operations like cataloguing. A wider use of outsourcing is inevitable following a recent agreement between the Commonwealth and state governments to introduce legislation to allow competition in the provision of services which have been to date the prerogative of state government monopolies. 27 Outsourcing may prove to be an economically justified

26 At both Commonwealth and state levels, Australia had, prior to 1984, various statutory authorities and government businesses which operated under different guidelines to government deparm~ents, though the extent of the difference varied, for example some had staffoperating under public service rules, others were more autonomous [Wettenhall, R. (1990) Australia's daring experiment in public enterprise. InA. Kouzmin and N. Scott. DynamicsinAustralianpublicmanagemenL.selectedessays. Melbourne. Macmillan. 1990. p. 13]. Since the reform processes began the various governments have sought either to move these bodies closer to private sector models increasing returns from them etc., or sell such ventures depending on the appropriateness and/or attractiveness to the private sector of the enterprise. The impacts on the library service in the government business enterprises has been to move closer to the business model in their operations, in line with their parent body.

27Sydney Morning Herald (1995) Professor's delight as radical plan survives unscathed. Sydney Morning Herald, 12 April, 1995, p. 4. In the state of Victoria, which has in the last few years been leading the reform agenda in this area, changes introduced into local government legislation in 1994 require a build up of competitive tendering (renderers can be in-house) from 20% for 1994/95 to 50% of total expenses by 1996/97 [Ainsaar, M. and B. Haratsis (1994) A gu/de to compulso~ competitive tendering

forpublic libraries. Melbourne. Arts Victoria Office of IAbrary Services. 1994. p. 2]. Pubfic fibraries will almost certainly be involved in regard to technical services (they have a long history of outsourcing in this area) and no doubt other aspects oflibrary activities will also come in for scrutiny.


course for a library, however the decision obviously has a number of ramifications--positions, in-house expertise and space lost might be difficult to regain. In addition to the management skills needed to make valid assessments with regard to contracting, there is a need for an adequate internal management information system to establish benefits (cost and otherwise) from a particular course of action. Other considerations bearing on contracting and tendering are the preparation of service specifications and the development of the indicators to be used to evaluate what is provided, for if these are inadequate the service received under the contract may be deficient in important respects. Whilst the discussion to date has probably tended to concentrate on concerns and possible negative consequences of outsourcing, the upside of outsourcing may be that individual libraries find themselves in the position of being able to offer services previously not possible through lack of staff expertise, equipment or some other factor.

Another financial reform has been the introduction of accrual accounting into Commonwealth Government departments. While this change received some attention in the early days of the reform process, it was not taken up explicitly until the end of 1992 at which point the government made it clear that accrual accounting was to be introduced across all departments. 28 Prior to this, traditional government fund accounting was concerned only with reporting on money received and money paid and did not take into account the "existence and changes in values of assets, revenue received outside of normal appropriations, investments and employer liabilities such as superannuation contributions". 29 Whilst the introduction of accrual accounting is probably a prerequisite to produce the cost data required for determining prices for cost-recovery or for- profit services and for making decisions about outsourcing operations, it is another area with the potential for major impacts for libraries. The value of a library's book, stock as an asset has usually been considered problematical, 3° other aspects of a fibrary may also prove difficult to handle when all aspects of its "cost", including capital investment, are made explicit in the financial statement through the implementation of accrual accounting. Additionally, thought needs to be given about how to handle the cost of items such as serial subscriptions and standing orders though the author is of the view that if the librarian has a good working relation-

2SAustralia. Task Force on Management Improvement, p. 314. ~ibid. p. 313. 3o The State Library of New South Wales was concerned about the likely impacts of putting a value

on its collection when accrual accounting was introduced in that state. It was successful in having the collection valued at a nominal $1, the justification being the "unique or cultural attributes of the vast majority of acquisitions, which will be retained in perpetuity" [State Library of New South Wales. (1994) Annual Report 1993/1994, p. 96].

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ship, and regular consultation, with those implementing accrual accounting for their department many of the aspects of accrual accounting which are thought to be problematical will prove less so.

This financial reform area provides a good illustration of the extent of new management skills that is required by many public servants including librarians.

Similarly, the structural changes introduced as part of the machinery of government reforms have required new knowledge and skills throughout most levels of an organization, a consequence of the underlying principle of the devolution of responsibility for decision-making to lower levels of the organization. The structural reforms have also flattened organizational structure and have involved the elimination of many middle management positions, a trend incidentally not restricted to the public sector . 31 Th i s , together with the general approach favouring the downsizing of central administrative units of various departments, has led to staff redundancies and redeployment 32 which admittedly were not always handled well 33 so probably producing unnecessarily high levels of anxiety. For example, the Department of Social Security, a very large government department, reorganized its structure from what had been a common o n e - - a central office in Canberra, state offices, area offices and regional offices--to a structure which eliminated the state offices and sought "to devolve as far as possible responsibility for decision-making and for resource allocation and use to the area and regional offices", a4 The accompanying change in library provision was the amalgamation of several state branch libraries into the National DSS Library Services. 35

Another aspect of the structural change has been to relate structure to programs, a6 a pattern which fits with program budgeting and performance evaluation requirements. Performance evaluation had a central place in FMIP though progress with its implementation was slower than first anticipated, leading a 1988 review of FMIP to report that: "Progress on this aspect [of program management and budgeting] has been limited . . .

sl Selby Smith, C. (1989) Restructuring office work in the Australian Public Service. In D. Corbett et aL O~ds) Public sector personnel polides for the 1990's. Clayton, Vic. Public Sector Management Institute M0nash Unlvcrsity. 1989. p. 193.

s2 MeI~od, R. (1989) Cut-backs, redeployment, redundancy. In D. Corbett et al. (Eds) Public sector personnelpolidesfor the 1990's. Clayton, Vie. Public Sector Management Institute Monash University. 1989. p. 91.

3s Selby Smith, C. (1993) A New Career Service? In M. Gardner (Ed.) Human resource management and industrial rda~ms in thepubli¢ sector. Brisbane. Centre for Australian Public Sector Management. 1993. p. 1~9. • ~Volker, D. (1992) Maint~ing a clientperspecti~e in a changing endronment--a balancing act? Canberra.

Australian Government Publishing Service. 1992. p. 3. s! Australia. Department of Soda[' Security (1992) Annual reporg 1991192, p. 68. a6 Australia. Task Force on Management Improvement, p. 61.


[suggesting] that development of effectiveness performance indicators is a very long term process". 37 Certainly this comment, now some years old, reflects the author's impression about the development of performance indicators within many public sector libraries. That the process has been slow reflects not only the pressure of varied demands arising from the management reform agenda but also the time and effort required for the identification of appropriate indicators and the setting up of mechanisms to capture the associated data.

With devolution and the greater responsibility of managers in allocating resources, human resources management and other decisions, has gone tighter reporting requirements which included the regular reporting on program performance, referred to above. These various demands have been accompanied by various other requirements, such as the development of a corporate plan and program budget--as has been remarked on above in relation to other requirements--often require new skills and are time- consuming operations. When the management skills associated with implementing these various requirements are added to other changes surrounding the librarian, for example the massive changes in the information environment of their professional practice, then the extent of the challenges, opportunities and demands facing the librarian becomes clear.

H U M A N R E S O U R C E S M A N A G E M E N T R E F O R M S

Human resources management and industrial relations poficies have also been changing rapidly across the public sector. 3s A major component of the APS reform process was the restructuring of job classifications which began soon after the change of government in 1983. This started with the lower level clerical positions and was later expanded to include other levels of the clerical/administrative/professional job structure? 9 By December 1987, all office-based work in the Australian Public Service had been reviewed affecting over 110 000 staff, some two-thirds of the APS stat:f. 4° The outcome of the review was a new broadbanded eight-level Admin- istrative Service Officer Structure (previously 93 separate classification categories) into which all but the highest level of the APS, the Senio~ Executive Service, fits. The previous narrow-banding of positions had

37 Australia. Department of Finance, p. 57. 38 Gardner, M. (Ed.) (1993) Human resource management and industrial relations in the public sector. Brisbane.

Centre for Australian Public Sector Management. 1993. p. xi. 39 Curtain, R. (1993) New job structures in the public sector: intent, process and outcomes. In M.

Gardner (Ed.) Human resource management and industrial relations in the public sector. Brisbane. Oentre for Auswalian Public Sector Management. 1993.

a°Selby Smith (1993) p. 16.

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limited both career paths and internal efficiency within departments as demarcation barriers limited worker flexibility. The changes in job classifications had a number of functions in addition to the streamlining and productivity improvement wanted from all the reforms. One was to bring about a more multi-skilled workforce, a trend in line with the Government's general approach to industrial relations reform and the realization of the "clever country" referred to earlier. While few would disagree with the concept of multi-sMiling, in practice its introduction puts substantial strain on staff training and development resources, an experience which the literature suggests has occurred. 41 The structural changes have put an additional pressure on training resources, namely the preparation and training required to make the changes work. Extensive attitude and work practice change is required to break down the traditional hierarchical approach of the APS. A feeling for the extent of the change and the resulting required informing and training can be gauged from the foUowing comment in the 1992 review of the Australian public service which states:

"The perceived paucity of feedback and information to staff is a particular concern. The problem increases dramatically at lower classification levels . . . There seems to be insufficient commitment by managers, including senior managers, to explaining to their immediate subordinates the direction of the APS". '°

The human resources management reforms have put increased emphasis on demonstrated skills and less emphasis on formal qualifications. The old Technical Officer classifications under which library technicians were placed was opened up to people without formal qualifications but who had skills in the type of work required. While this was seen as a way to make positions available to a wider range of employees than had been the case, some librarians experienced a less satisfactory outcome, namely that they were obliged to take redeployed staff without library training into para-professional positions. 4~ It is also worth noting that while fibrarians did well in terms of grade parity with other professions in the APS, a result of the realignment was that very few positions now exist within government department libraries for professional officer class 1, the grade for beginning librarians. 44 This in turn has implications for the preparation of future librarians as new library and information service graduates have less opportunity to gain beginning experience.

There have been other prongs to the human resource management reforms including the introduction of policies to ensure Equal Employment

41 Curtain, p. 30. 42 Australia. Task force on management improvement, p. 12. 4a Currie, G. (1992) A nice job for a lady: industrial issues for librarians in the 90s. Australian Libra,,

and Information Association. 2nd Biennial Conference, Albuo,-Wodonga (NS. W..- Vie). Proceedings, pp. 80-86. ibid.


Opportunity (EEO) and to eliminate discrimination against various dis- advantages groups such as women and the disabled. Reforms have also been aimed at improving Occupational Health and Safety, improving access to part-time work and through the changes in position classification throughout the APS the improvement of career paths for public servants. A number of these reforms have the potential to be particularly helpful to the female-dominated library staff.

I N D U S T R I A L R E L A T I O N S R E F O R M S

In addition to industrial relations reforms within the pubfic sector's management policies, there have been major changes in industrial relations at national and state levels which are affecting most of the Australian workforce including the public sector. A brief account of the thrust of the change seems in order to round out this account of public sector workplace change.

In 1987, the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, the body responsible for ratifying industrial agreements at Commonwealth level (there are state equivalents whose rulings tend to follow those of the national body), 45 introduced a two-tier structure of wage determination. Under this approach the first tier was a salary increase given to all workers and the second tier was to be determined at enterprise level and tied to increased productivity. Prior to this major shift, industrial agreements reached by unions and employer groups might have national or state coverage and would apply to all union members regardless of productivity achieved at the individual workplace. The new approach, known as "enterprise bargaining", came with the prescription that second tier increases be dependent on the setting up of enterprise agreements, a process which is occurring, though more slowly than was initially anticipated. The enterprise-bargaining process involves employers and representatives of employees (which may or may not be union representatives according to employees preference) reaching an agreement, which is subsequently registered, about conditions and wages.

While there is protection for workers in the control over registering enterprise agreements groups of workers may be more or less well served by the agreement reached. It is, for example, not hard to envisage that the library staff in say a particular government department negotiating its enterprise agreement could be in a difficult situation in regard to negotiations. They would be a minority group in the enterprise and conse-

45 Rafferty, F. (1991) Pay equity: an industrial relations anomaly. Journal of Industrial Relations 33(1), p. 18.

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quently the classification, career profile and pay issues which affect them would be negotiated from the perspectives of other workers. This may not serve the interests of either the library or the library staffparticularly well. For example, those negotiating may see library work as requiring less knowledge and skill than it does, or perhaps issues which have a significance for the profession as a whole "could be traded away by the union's enterprise bargaining team for that agency, who might not realize their importance, or if they do, might not care". 46 Indeed it is not too hard to envisage the stripping of some of the more expensive quality aspects of library activities to achieve the productivity gains required for wage increases.

The author believes that enterprise agreements have the potential to lead to particular difficulties for small special libraries in which the library staff is only a small proportion of total staff. It is likely that their interests may not be well represented in negotiations conducted by people who give priority in bargaining to the interests of larger aggregates of people in the workplace or have tittle understanding of library and information work. To state the obvious, the likelihood of this occurring would be lessened, possibly substantially, if library staff were represented on the workplace bargaining team.

I M P A C T S ON L I B R A R I E S AND L I B R A R I A N S

Few would suggest that Australian library staff in the 1990's are not "living in interesting times". New information technology has wrought massive changes in the way information is accessed and stored and also on the expectations of library clients. The new management requirements and changing external circumstances discussed in this paper are also having major impacts on Australian public sector libraries. Change is set to continue, and almost certainly there will be shifts in the direction of the reforms in future years, as there were over the past decade. Currently, the reform programs of the various levels of government have moved toward placing more importance on "customer service", which is finding expression in the requirements of agencies (and sections of them like libraries) to explicitly state the type and quality of service they will provide (a service charter) and subsequently be evaluated against whether their service delivers what has been promised, all of course within tight budgets. Approaches to improving customer service being introduced into public sector organizations include Total Quality Management, Best Practice and Continuous Improvement and whatever management approach is

4~ Gurrie, p. 82.


introduced into the wider agency is almost certainly expected to be implemented also in the library. To repeat a recurring comment throughout this paper, librarians have been, and will continue to be, required to master and implement new management approaches and techniques into the future. Whilst the introduction of many of the management innovations has been, and will continue to be, time consuming, they have provided, and will continue to provide, opportunities to upgrade what the library can offer with the resources made available to it.

The introduction of more competition in the delivery of government services through the use of outsourcing is receiving much attention in Australia at present, with enabling legislation being introduced at the Commonwealth and state levels. It was remarked above that this is an area which the author believes will have a substantial impact on library and information services over the next few years. There are concerns, for example, that adequate tender specifications and performance targets are laid down for work which is contracted out. On the positive side, this development also has the potential to offer rewards. As mentioned above, maybe a library can contract for a service which it knows will be of value to its clients but could never provide itself, maybe some of the more repetitive, time-consuming work can be contracted allowing the librarian to concentrate on providing client service.

A closing thought on the outsourcing issue concerns the implications arising from the fact that it will change a situation which has largely applied in regard to library services, namely that there has been little competition. As outsourcing becomes more widespread, businesses will emerge to take up the work on offer. The profession in Australia needs to start discussing who will be running and working in those businesses. The author hopes many librarians and library technicians will move in and take this ground rather than let much of the work go to others who respond to the wider culture change of consultants and contractors providing services previously done in-house.

public sector reform in australia and its impact on libraries

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