I think Australians in general exaggerate the level of concentration of the APS in Canberra (and the size of the APS in general). Canberra generally has about 38% or 60,000 members of the APS. New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland collectively have about 45% of the APS.
That said, its true that certain types of APS roles are Canberran - typically in the policy development space, because of a history and expectation of face-to-face engagement with parliament and other agencies extending down hierarchies. And we are of course in the middle of the remote work revolution.
And of course the APS is 'small' compared to the numbers of people employed as 'bureaucrats' by state and territory governments. The ACT Government employs I think around 30,000 people directly, although this includes something like 8,000 nurses and teachers and such.
Canberra is the national capital. Part of the whole point of establishing Canberra was to centralise government there. Even with remote working, there’s a lot of advantages to face to face interactions in APS work environments. Every other country has a national capital for the same reason.
Regarding the possibility of Canberra being attacked, the reason it’s located inland was to protect the capital from attacks from the sea. During the Cold War the ONA assessed that it was unlikely that Canberra or other Australian cities would be attacked.
> Every other country has a national capital for the same reason.
Except other countries get London, Paris, Tokyo, Madrid, Seoul, Hong Kong, Berlin, even Washington DC has stuff to do.....and we get stuck in a miserable cold shithole that's basically a country town.
It wasn't too long ago that a lot of government work was paper based and things were all in person. Government relocation benefits used to be more standard.
It'll take the APS wholesale a long time to decentralise. Everything there is an effort, it gets a reasonable amount of pushback, for every person who doesn't mind relocating there is someone who is happily settled in CBR with a good support network.
Which goes back to why canberra was created in the first place. So as not to be seen to advantage either Sydbey or Melbourne, who both wanted to be the capital city way back before Australia was Australia.
So now we all get stuck in a miserable cold shithole that's basically a country town. We need a full time WFH from anywhere revolution NOW so I can go back to Melbourne.
As someone who's lived in Canberra for 35+ years and watched it morph into a monstrosity, I agree. I want a red brick cottage on a large plot of land far away from Andrew Barr.
Times have changed from the days where there was a need for centralisation. Even if you were to decentralise to within two hours of Canberra, the boost you would provide the economies of towns like Cooma, south Coast, goulburn, crookwell etc would be immense not to mention easing housing pressures in Canberra itself
I think you'd kill most of those towns if you moved an agency there. Crookwell for one is not equipped to host an extra 5000 people. I mean, if the workers could work remotely from wherever and the agency remained in Canberra, that'd benefit crookwell and the like.
I actually see it the other way, the addition pupils at schools unlocks funding normally reserved for the city schools, population drives economic growth in these areas. In most of these areas the local councils are the largest employers and the townships rely on councils for employment. Additional government roles surely couldn't be a bad thing.
I guess it's sort of like gaols and the economic growth they bring to a region albeit maybe not kind of population growth you would wish for
Sure if you did it slowly but if you people dumped where do they get the extra classrooms from? The extra teachers needed? The extra houses required? The extra groceries required to ensure the local grocery store can supply everyone?
It's where this little detail called "Parliament" tends to set up shop from time to time...
We shouldn't all be forced to move to a miserable cold shithole though. Let us WFH from anywhere we want, it's 2024!
I think Australians in general exaggerate the level of concentration of the APS in Canberra (and the size of the APS in general). Canberra generally has about 38% or 60,000 members of the APS. New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland collectively have about 45% of the APS. That said, its true that certain types of APS roles are Canberran - typically in the policy development space, because of a history and expectation of face-to-face engagement with parliament and other agencies extending down hierarchies. And we are of course in the middle of the remote work revolution. And of course the APS is 'small' compared to the numbers of people employed as 'bureaucrats' by state and territory governments. The ACT Government employs I think around 30,000 people directly, although this includes something like 8,000 nurses and teachers and such.
Canberra is the national capital. Part of the whole point of establishing Canberra was to centralise government there. Even with remote working, there’s a lot of advantages to face to face interactions in APS work environments. Every other country has a national capital for the same reason. Regarding the possibility of Canberra being attacked, the reason it’s located inland was to protect the capital from attacks from the sea. During the Cold War the ONA assessed that it was unlikely that Canberra or other Australian cities would be attacked.
> Every other country has a national capital for the same reason. Except other countries get London, Paris, Tokyo, Madrid, Seoul, Hong Kong, Berlin, even Washington DC has stuff to do.....and we get stuck in a miserable cold shithole that's basically a country town.
It wasn't too long ago that a lot of government work was paper based and things were all in person. Government relocation benefits used to be more standard. It'll take the APS wholesale a long time to decentralise. Everything there is an effort, it gets a reasonable amount of pushback, for every person who doesn't mind relocating there is someone who is happily settled in CBR with a good support network.
You know what Canberra is, right ?
I wasn't aware that we were short any workers. It's accommodation for these workers we frequently run short of
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Which goes back to why canberra was created in the first place. So as not to be seen to advantage either Sydbey or Melbourne, who both wanted to be the capital city way back before Australia was Australia.
So now we all get stuck in a miserable cold shithole that's basically a country town. We need a full time WFH from anywhere revolution NOW so I can go back to Melbourne.
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just get with the times and let people work from home and live where they actually want to live!
As someone who's lived in Canberra for 35+ years and watched it morph into a monstrosity, I agree. I want a red brick cottage on a large plot of land far away from Andrew Barr.
Cause its were the government lives
This isn't a new concept. All countries have a hub where all government agencies are centralised.
They still make grads come to Canberra
Only for smaller agencies, or larger, fossilized agencies
It’s one of the safest places to put a data centre, they’re not all piled up next to each other.
Times have changed from the days where there was a need for centralisation. Even if you were to decentralise to within two hours of Canberra, the boost you would provide the economies of towns like Cooma, south Coast, goulburn, crookwell etc would be immense not to mention easing housing pressures in Canberra itself
I think you'd kill most of those towns if you moved an agency there. Crookwell for one is not equipped to host an extra 5000 people. I mean, if the workers could work remotely from wherever and the agency remained in Canberra, that'd benefit crookwell and the like.
I actually see it the other way, the addition pupils at schools unlocks funding normally reserved for the city schools, population drives economic growth in these areas. In most of these areas the local councils are the largest employers and the townships rely on councils for employment. Additional government roles surely couldn't be a bad thing. I guess it's sort of like gaols and the economic growth they bring to a region albeit maybe not kind of population growth you would wish for
Sure if you did it slowly but if you people dumped where do they get the extra classrooms from? The extra teachers needed? The extra houses required? The extra groceries required to ensure the local grocery store can supply everyone?