[Peetwo]

ScoMo sacks COAT M&M -   

On one of our email chains the following distorted message under the heading of 'Dept Heads':

"..Not sure what u mean re COAT -finger trouble? -  many would agree he was a C- -T..."

Reply: "..C*** of a thing = COAT..."

Then after purveying the latest news from inside the Can'tberra bubble, the penny dropped.... 

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Four departments and five secretaries cut while one returns, as PM reshapes the public service

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[img=795x0]https://www.themandarin.com.au/content/uploads/2019/12/pieces-of-the-puzzle-592798_1280.jpg[/img] 

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has unveiled a massive Australian Public Service shake-up, which will see five secretaries out of their jobs, after a morning of confusion as rumours and leaks made their way into multiple major media outlets hours before the official statement.

After allowing various elements of the biggest story about the APS for decades to trickle out and flow through the filters of various news outlets this morning, Morrison released the following media statement shortly before 11.30am, confirming five secretaries will be gone when the changes take effect on February 1, 2020:

• Department of Communications and the Arts secretary Mike Mrdak
  
  
• Department of Human Services secretary Renée Leon
  
  
• Department of Agriculture secretary Daryl Quinlivan
  
  
• Department of Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business secretary Kerri Hartland
  
  
• Department of Industry, Innovation and Science secretary Heather Smith
  

One rumour that turned out to be wrong was the idea that Health secretary Glenys Beauchamp was in the firing line. She is not.

Another rumour was on the money: former APS secretary Andrew Metcalfe will return to the fold after working for Ernst and Young since 2013. He will head up the Department of Agriculture, which will also cover policy related to Water and the Environment.
Here’s the full statement from Morrison:

Today, I am announcing changes to the structure of the Australian Public Service (APS) as part of our reform agenda to put Australians at the centre of Government.
This morning, the Governor-General approved my recommendation to reduce the number of Government departments from 18 to 14, to ensure the services that Australians rely on are delivered more efficiently and effectively.
Australians should be able to access simple and reliable services, designed around their needs.  Having fewer departments will allow us to bust bureaucratic congestion, improve decision-making and ultimately deliver better services for the Australian people.
The new structure will drive greater collaboration on important policy challenges. For example, better integrating the Government’s education and skills agenda and ensuring Australians living in regional areas can access the infrastructure and services they need.
The following changes will take effect on 1 February 2020:

• The creation of the Department of Education, Skills and Employment, which will consolidate:
  

o   the current Department of Education; and
o   the current Department of Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business.

• The creation of the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, which will consolidate:
  

o   the current Department of Agriculture; and
o   environment functions from the current Department of the Environment and Energy.

• The creation of the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources, which will consolidate:
  

o   the current Department of Industry, Innovation and Science;
o   energy functions from the current Department of the Environment and Energy; and
o   small business functions from the current Department of Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business.

• The creation of the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications, which will consolidate:
  

o   the current Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Cities and Regional Development; and
o   the current Department of Communications and the Arts.

• The Department known as Services Australia (formerly known as the Department of Human Services) will be established as a new Executive Agency, within the Social Services Department.
  

Ten departments remain unchanged.
I am also announcing today that the remit of the North Queensland Livestock Industry Recovery Agency will be expanded to include drought.  The Hon Shane Stone AC QC will lead the new National Drought and North Queensland Flood Response and Recovery Agency, providing national leadership and a whole-of-government response to support our farmers and regional communities as they respond to, and recover from, the drought and the north Queensland flood from earlier this year.
The Agency will sit within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and report to the Minister for Water Resources, Drought, Rural Finance, Natural Disaster and Emergency Management, the Hon David Littleproud MP.
As a consequence of these machinery changes, there will be movement and change amongst the Secretaries of departments.  The following Secretaries will not continue to hold office in the new structure when it takes effect on 1 February 2020:

• Ms Kerri Hartland;
  
  
• Ms Renée Leon PSM;
  
  
• Mr Mike Mrdak AO;
  
  
• Mr Daryl Quinlivan; and
  
  
• Dr Heather Smith PSM.
  

Each of these senior officials has served their country with dedication, commitment and a deep sense of public service over many years, and their advice, achievements and leadership have been valued by governments past and present.
On behalf of the Government and all Australians, I thank Ms Hartland, Ms Leon, Mr Mrdak, Mr Quinlivan and Dr Smith for everything they have done to advance Australia’s interests, and for their service, and I wish them all the best in their future endeavours.
Mr David Fredericks, currently the Secretary of the Department of the Environment and Energy, will move to be Secretary of the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources.
Mr Andrew Metcalfe AO will take up the position of Secretary of the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment. Mr Metcalfe was Secretary of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship from 2005 to 2012 and Secretary of the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry in 2013. Since then he has been a partner at EY (Ernst and Young). He will bring considerable public policy leadership experience to the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment and to the Secretaries Board.
The new structure will be implemented before Parliament returns next year. A full list of the new departments and Secretaries is provided below.
I have a deep respect for public servants and their work in delivering the Government’s agenda. I look forward to continuing to work with the public service to achieve the best outcomes for the Australian people.
The new structure of departments and Secretaries, on 1 February 2020, will be:

Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment
Mr Andrew Metcalfe AO
Attorney-General’s Department
Mr Chris Moraitis PSM
Department of Defence
Mr Greg Moriarty
Department of Education, Skills and Employment
Dr Michelle Bruniges AM
Department of Finance
Ms Rosemary Huxtable PSM
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
Ms Frances Adamson
Department of Health
Ms Glenys Beauchamp PSM
Department of Home Affairs
Mr Michael Pezzullo
Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources
Mr David Fredericks
Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications
Mr Simon Atkinson
Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet
Mr Philip Gaetjens
Department of Social Services
Ms Kathryn Campbell AO CSC
Department of the Treasury
Dr Steven Kennedy PSM
Department of Veterans’ Affairs
Ms Liz Cosson AM CSC

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Plus from: https://www.themandarin.com.au/122204-ou...e=mandarin

Mrdak informed his staff of the changes shortly before the announcement, and said he was only alerted to the news himself on Wednesday afternoon.

“Our department will cease to exist and our functions and responsibilities will be incorporated into a newly established Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Cities, Regional Development and Communications,” he wrote on Thursday.

“I was told of the government’s decision to abolish the department late yesterday afternoon. We were not permitted any opportunity to provide advice on the Machinery of Government changes, nor were our views ever sought on any proposal to abolish the department or to changes to our structure and operations. At this time I understand that all of our functions, responsibilities, staff and programmes will transfer into the new department.”

He said he would keep staff updated on further news, but the changes would see the end of his 32-year career in the public service.

“I will do my best with our SES (executive) team to ensure that there is as much certainty as possible for all of you, and our agencies, and a continuity of services for the community we serve.”
“This has been the most wonderful opportunity I could ever have imagined in my career.
“I will miss this department, all of you and the APS terribly.”

Hmm...home to roost, we always new he was brilliant but definitely a wrong'n - 

Next I came across this rather amusing Annabel Crabb (via the other Aunty) article which IMO thoroughly sums up the achievements (or not) of ScoMo's govt over the last 7 months...

 

For Scott Morrison, electoral triumph has brought a weirdly shrunken field of vision

By Annabel Crabb

Updated about 7 hours ago

[b]PHOTO:[/b] It's been a year made remarkable by the frequency with which obstacles have disappeared from the Prime Minister's path. (ABC News: Mark Moore)

[b]RELATED STORY:[/b] The dogged determination to protect Angus Taylor defies not just common sense but political self-interest

And so ends Scomovia's first full political calendar year.

A year that began with the discreet departures of Coalition megafauna convinced the jig was up, and closes with a resurgent Prime Minister kicking away the last remaining crutch of Labor's parliamentary dominance — the medevac legislation.

It's been a year made remarkable by the frequency with which obstacles have disappeared from the Prime Minister's path.

In recent weeks, both Mr Morrison's Lodge predecessors bade farewell to their political careers: Malcolm Turnbull with a cocktail party at Point Piper's Cruising Yacht Club (hello, sailor!) and Tony Abbott with a thousand fans at the grand ballroom of the Miramare Gardens, where MC Alan Jones (who else?) sorrowed for the "hundreds" turned away, not including Margie Abbott who — Mr Jones gallantly explained — was at St Vincent's hospital "recovering comfortably" from a lumpectomy.

 




[b]VIDEO:[/b] Tony Abbott takes the blame for losing the seat of Warringah (ABC News)

The Liberal Party, too, has had a double lumpectomy with the excision of both Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull from its parliamentary ranks. One was performed by the voters of Warringah on May 18, the second a DIY day procedure performed by Mr Turnbull's own hand — and the party is left resting comfortably for the first time in a decade.

Indeed, the Prime Minister is the first Liberal leader in all that time who is not obliged to sleep with one eye open.

Since approximately 7:25pm on May 18 this year, when ABC election druid Antony Green turned to camera and remarked that the returns from the voting booths were looking weirdly inconsistent with what the polls were predicting, Scott Morrison has been in the historically unusual position, as leader of the Liberal Party, of being able to confidently order his stationery in bulk.

Safest jobs in the country

The Liberal Party may be the only workplace in Australia where job security is in a purple patch right now.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics reports that redundancies in Australia have risen by nearly half over the past two years, but within the Liberal Party, you really have to work at losing a job these days.

[/url]Politicians keep shifting the goal posts

A question for students of bad bits of history has always been: how did people let such a thing happen? Now it feels like we are getting a very real answer in the way the world is moving.

Being — for example — the Energy Minister really seems to bring a remarkable robustness of tenure.

Twenty-eight years ago, Angus Taylor was one of Australia's Rhodes Scholars.

Born and raised in Nimmitabel, NSW, Mr Taylor crossed the ocean to seek intellectual adventure and to not quite meet Naomi Wolf, an encounter he would later relate in in-Nimmitabel style in his maiden speech, from which the listener might gently infer that a young Taylor had gone to war with Oxford's Wolfian hordes of New York-raised PC warriors to defend the common room's Christmas tree.

Now, everyone needs a foundation myth, and this is especially true of the crusading conservative. Oxford is the place where Tony Abbott arranged a pro-Thatcher rally during the Falklands War, after all, so it's more or less incumbent on an aspiring PM like Angus Taylor to have struck a few blows for freedom.

Tragically, fresh reportage of Mr Taylor's first speech seems to have coincided this week with an unusually fallow patch in Dr Wolf's diary.

The writer — who insists that she "loves Christmas" — has robustly sought a correction, including by means of a direct telephone call to Mr Taylor's parliamentary office, where — coincidentally enough — the phone was picked up by a staffer defiantly carrying on his boss's legacy of honouring Christmas, quite possibly with a few glasses of shiraz.

Dr Wolf, who thoughtfully filmed herself making the call over Skype, subsequently posted the footage on YouTube, where it remains as a lesson to political staffers of all persuasions that sometimes it's best just to let the phone ring out.

The Oxford factor

It's not like being a Rhodes scholar guarantees one the prime ministership, exactly, but it certainly doesn't hurt, as Bob Hawke, Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull could attest.

Mr Abbott described his time at Oxford as "golden", and borrowed the British poet Frances Cornford's lovely, elegiac line to aver that the place had left him "magnificently unprepared for the long littleness of life".

The determination to protect Angus Taylor defies self-interest

Scott Morrison has spent the week defending the indefensible behaviour of his minister. So much political capital expended and so little return, writes Laura Tingle.

By contrast, however, Oxford seems to have left Mr Taylor perfectly reconciled to the long littleness of life.

How else would you explain a Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction whose two most widely-recorded achievements in office relate to the weed-wanding of a 30 hectare block of land near Cooma, and the apparent forgery of some local council documents?

I mean — fine. Fight the fight. Make the point about the eradication of Serrated Tussock, or preoccupy yourself with taunting the failure of various City of Sydney officials to observe an absolute zero emissions policy, in a political tactic that owes more to Student Politics 101 than it does to the dreaming spires.

But really — and the question needs to be asked — is that all there is?

The Prime Minister has clung defiantly to his minister, even making — in the presence of his Attorney General, Christian Porter — a phone call to the NSW Police Commissioner to suss out just how strike-forcey the Strike Force into Mr Taylor was actually going to be, ballpark.

[b]PHOTO:[/b] Being the Energy Minister really seems to bring a remarkable robustness of tenure. (ABC News: Marco Catalano)

A surprising move, you might think — especially given the supervision of Mr Porter, an Attorney with established expertise in governmental telephone etiquette, having one year earlier taken the rather extraordinary step of writing to the Solicitor General and directing him not to answer prime minister Malcolm Turnbull's phone calls.

PM's shrunken field of vision

Whatever the ethics of Call-The-Cops-Gate, the fact remains that the Prime Minister concludes the year wreathed in bushfire smoke, besieged by parched farmers, contemplating a summer of power outages and country towns running dry, all the while lashed to an energy and climate minister who seems — to put it ultra-mildly — to have a problem with detail, not to mention appearing in public without facing shouted questions about Naomi Wolf.

It's been a remarkable first year as PM for Scott Morrison

After 12 months as prime minister, Scott Morrison looks the strong leader, clearly in charge and with few constraints. But analysing his ideology has always been to plunge into a puzzle box, writes Michelle Grattan.

For the Prime Minister, too, electoral triumph has brought a weirdly shrunken field of vision.

Scott Morrison's mandate was one of the most straightforward in living political history.

No Tony-Abbott-style policy creatures from the deep for this guy; Scott Morrison is a man who explicitly promised to cut personal income taxes, definitely implied that he would continue to wear a peaked cap for casual occasions, and firmly assured us that he wouldn't do any of the stuff Bill Shorten wanted.

PROMISES KEPT!

Aside from tax cuts, this man was essentially elected NOT to do stuff. And to be fair, he's delivered in spades.

Viewed through the rear-vision mirror of history, the 2019 election tactic reveals itself as seriously brilliant; possibly the most diabolically ingenious piece of political strategy since Barnaby Joyce hit upon the idea of enhancing his family values appeal by the simple expedient of having more families.

But it's created — as the sun sets on the parliamentary year of 2019, crimsoned with bushfire haze — a political equation of unbearable poignancy.

[b]PHOTO:[/b] Scott Morrison's mandate was one of the most straightforward in living political history. (ABC: Marco Catalano)

A stash of political capital

The Prime Minister with the biggest stash of political capital in a decade turns out also to be the one with the narrowest field of ambition. What are the odds, hey?

On the Liberal Party's website, the Government crisply enumerates its headline achievements for the year, viz:

• Delivered tax relief to 10 million workers.
  
  
• Cut deeming rates for pensioners.
  
  
• Installed permanent funding support for drought projects.
  
  
• Introduced legislation to tackle union law-breaking.
  
  
• Moved ahead with around 160 major infrastructure projects around Australia.
  

The inclusion in the list of the introduction of an anti-union bill that history records was brought down at the last minute by a one-night stand featuring Pauline Hanson and the Australian Labor Party (imagine the morning after — heavens!) gives you a feel for what the drafting process of the list itself might have been like.

"What about religious freedom — shall we bung that in?"
"Nope, better not. We've delayed that bill. Turns out it's really hard."
"What about the Commonwealth Integrity Commission we announced a year ago? That done yet?"
"Ah, nope. Also hard."
"What about the thing we did banning the vegan farm trespassers?"
"Hmmm. Bit niche. Also they were already banned under state laws, so."
"What about delaying the scheduled increase to the superannuation guarantee?"
"SHUT UP!!! We haven't even SAID that yet you IDIOT! Right. I'm shifting this to Confide."

It's not been Labor's year

For Labor, it is fair to say that 2019 has not gone as intended.

Rather than gloriously deploying all the money Chris Bowen had planned to recoup from franking credits and negative gearing, the party has spent the year essentially packing away the policy Christmas tree, and gloomily retraining journalists not to ask them any more what Labor would do, seeing as they're not likely to be in a position to do anything any time soon.

[b]PHOTO:[/b] For Labor, it is fair to say that 2019 has not gone as intended. (ABC News: Marco Catalano)

So deep are the wounds that they've not even had the heart for the traditional post-election-loss orgy of recrimination.

Even when things have gone well, it's been in circumstances of unthinkable horror, such as this week's vote on the Ensuring Integrity Bill, which on one hand was a victory for Labor and the union movement, but on the other was the person Anthony Albanese loathes most in Australia (Pauline Hanson) teaming up with Anthony Albanese to save the hide of the dude at number 2 on the Albanese Most Loathed List — John Setka.

I mean — in politics you take the win, especially if you've had a ropey year. But it's not always fun.

Christmas surprises under the tree

The end of the political year always brings a few surprise Kris Kringles.

For the Government, it was Pauline Hanson executing a Senate-floor reverse ferret on the Ensuring Integrity Bill and voting to defeat it, a development gently suggestive of the possibility that Senate leader Mathias Cormann may have paid more attention to ensuring the integrity of the union movement than he did to ensuring the integrity of his Senate numbers.

The secret deal and the medevac repeal
[url=https://www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack/what-is-medevac-bill-explainer/11764974]
Triple J tracks how Malcolm Turnbull's rolling as prime minister set off a chain of events that leads right up to today.

For the Opposition, it was Jacqui Lambie voting with the Government to upend the Medevac legislation, a shocking reversal of the Labor-backed scheme to rescue unwell refugees from the offshore detention centres opened six years ago by … who was it? Oh yeah: Labor.

But who can stay angry with anyone, in a world which this week saw the reconciliation of Israel Folau and Rugby Australia?

Truly, it was a Christmas miracle. From their respective trenches, which have blazed all year with gunfire, rhetoric and GoFundMe requests, the two parties emerged, shyly unfurling the snowy flag of surrender; the football star who declared that gays and drunks were going to hell, and the rugby code that sacked him.

"While it was not Rugby Australia's intention, Rugby Australia acknowledges and apologises for any hurt or harm caused to the Folaus," the code declared, in a written statement that coyly avoided mention of the presumably colossal sum of money it had just agreed to shovel Mr Folau's way, but whose phrasing silently confirmed that none of the loot was spent on copy editors.

[b]YOUTUBE:[/b] Israel Folau posted a video calling for federal legislation to protect religious freedoms after the settlement.

Mr Folau (who a fortnight ago ventured the opinion that bushfires were God's way of getting back at humanity for gay marriage), was anxious to clear up any lingering suggestions of homophobia.

"Mr Folau wants all Australians to know that he does not condone discrimination of any kind against any person on the grounds of their sexuality and that he shares Rugby Australia's commitment to inclusiveness and diversity."

Awlrighty then.

Life wasn't meant to be easy

All that remains is for the Attorney-General, Mr Porter, to employ his renowned legislative needlepoint skills to fashion this mess into a workable piece of legislation.

How hard can it be? After all, free speech is free speech.

[b]PHOTO:[/b] All that remains is for the Attorney-General, Mr Porter, to employ his renowned legislative needlepoint skills to fashion this mess into a workable piece of legislation. (ABC News: Matt Roberts)

And individuals should be able to express their views or live their lives according to their beliefs without other people getting all triggered and making a gigantic fuss, right? I mean, people should be more robust.

The fact that this freedom ride is captained by a man who is triggered by toilet signs is a complication — sure. But life wasn't meant to be easy.

MTF...P2 

ps More on the new mega-dept Mandarin in due course...