The truth is there is a range of contradictions in respect of the way we participate in society – as voters or consumers. In the former we decide as members of a community deliberating on the range and limits of collective provision. In the latter we make decisions for ourselves and our families: which gas company? Which school? What form of health insurance?
There is a tension here that was not fully appreciated as the move to market solutions took hold. The point of public policy was defined as liberating the individual from the straightjacket of collective discipline except in the most basic areas of government provision such as national security, community safety and commercial regulation. Just as the adherents of this approach to government were uncomfortable in the face of politics with all its complexity, confusion, and compromise, so too were the public uncomfortable with the limitations the market model placed on the meaning of public purpose and participation.
By the early years of the twenty-first century both major parties in Australia were being urged by their supporters to ask harder questions about these matters, particularly privatisation. Even the open investment policies of the nation were put to the test when Shell made its unsuccessful bid to takeover Woodside Petroleum.
As a wider range of policies re-emerged as matters for public debate a level of choice returned with the Australian Labor Party (ALP) generally opposed to privatisation (if not to competition) and the Liberal Party generally but not always in favour of privatisation. The role played by State Labor Governments in facilitating this broader debate about ‘ends’ and ‘means’ was particularly important.
It has been the State Governments who have pioneered a strategic approach to government in Australia. All of the States have a strategic plan or are, in the case of New South Wales, in the process of developing one: Victoria’s Growing Victoria Together, Queensland’s Smart State Strategy, Western Australia’s Better Planning: Better Services and State Sustainability Strategy, South Australia’s Strategic Plan, Tasmania’s Tasmania Together 2020, and New South Wales’ A New Direction for the Future.
They all involve developing major themes for government, priority setting around sustainability–type objectives, the setting of targets or strategic outcomes, the involvement of the people and the monitoring of performance. Under the umbrella of such planning some major structural changes have been implemented and new means of public engagement introduced not just around particular policy issues like water, but also through Regional Cabinets and Regional Parliaments.[7]