Expert Ministers

It is ridiculous that the minister for health, or the minister for finance have zero qualifications or knowledge of the government departments they run. Their departments are actually run by a Secretary, the same as in the USA, but we never hear about them… Take a look at the list.

They each get paid around $700K per year, because unlike the MPs who head the departments, they do the real work. It is about time we knew who they are and that they were held accountable for their failures and praised for their successes…

Although the American political system has many faults, they appoint Secretaries who actually know their portfolio, and they hire the best person regardless of their political persuasion. The Secretaries are known to the public.

We advocate something similar to the American system, except the Secretaries are nominated at election time by each party. MPs can then concentrate on their core reason for existence, representing their electorate. It would also mean that the Secretaries are not necessarily politicians, and are more likely to speak plainly and not use as much spin.

Everyday management of their departments will be the job of the Secretaries (as they do currently) , while policy is still determined by the government, via committees. Consequently the media will talk to the Secretaries when there is operational news, and MPs when there is policy news.

This is a major change to how the Australian political system is portrayed to the public, so we advocate starting with two departments initially – education and military. Political parties will nominate who their Secretary will be for each, which will often mean retaining the incumbent, regardless of which party hired them.