Source: By Ross Peake - National Affairs Writer
The Foreign Affairs Department is losing more staff than usual, but puts the resignations down to head-hunting rather than the high workload imposed by the Rudd Government. A Senate estimates hearing was told 44 staff left the department in the March quarter, compared with an average resignation rate of 25 to 30 for a quarter.
Deputy secretary Doug Chester said 19 of the staff who left in the three months to March had transferred to other Government departments, compared with 31 transferring in the last financial year.
"[The figure of 44] is a little bit higher than normal.There is quite a deal of movement in the public service at the moment so it is quite understandable." Mr Chester said.
He dismissed a report that about 100 people had left the department since the change of government last year. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd suggested last week the leak of a cabinet submission had come from the public service.
He told bureaucrats they were expected to "burn the midnight oil" to implement his huge policy agenda. Mr Chester said projections in the budget for the department were fairly meaningless. The forward estimates did not compare "apples with apples" and did not include lapsing programs for which funding might be continued later.
"The further out you get with the forward estimates, the more misleading they are. There are many examples of lapsing programs where the funding is not included in the forward estimates, so what I say is you need to treat these with some level of caution, particularly the further out they cone," he said.
"The figures aren't inaccurate, you just need to read behind the figures to understand what they are." Liberals said they were surprised at the description of the forward estimates.
Liberal senator Russell Trood said, "What is anybody, not just an Opposition, to do if we can't look at these forward estimates and regard them as being indicative of the direction of the department's finances into the future?" Mr Chester said the situation was not new.
The estimates hearing was told Foreign Affairs regularly withheld the name of a new ambassador until the nominee was about to take tip the new post. Officials were asked about the rumoured appointment of Patil Grigson to Bangkok.
Mr Grigson, a senior departmental officer and former ambassador to Burma, was chosen as the temporary chief of staff by incoming Foreign Minister Stephen Smith. Mr Chester refused to confirm Mr Grigson's appointment.
Replacements for Australia's senior diplomats in several countries had been chosen but would not be announced until later in the year. Former ASI(_) head Dennis Richardson was given a one-year extension as ambassador in Washington.
The Government was not ready to name a replacement for former Liberal minister Richard Alston, who left the post of high commission in London in early March.
One reason delaying the announcement of the ambassador to Bangkok was the acceptance by the host country of the appointee - known as agrement - took longer in Thailand.
Mr Chester described as "rubbish" a story in The Australian yesterday that said the department was battling a policy paralysis in Mr Smith's office. He said Mr Smith had 47 stibinissions before him, but 25 arrived just last week.
"The minister has received 1346 submissions since he became minister," he said. About half had been dealt with. "So we are probably talking about 10 or 11 that have been there for some tine," Mr Chester said.
Mr Smith said in Perth it was not true policy decisions had to be cleared by Mr Rudd's office. "In a job like this, the job's never done, the work is never complete," he said.
DENIAL: Foreign Minister Stephen Smith says it is untrue policy decisions must be cleared by the Prime Minister's office.