Better Public Services Advisory Group Report - November 2011

Executive Summary
It is no over-statement to say that New Zealand faces the most challenging international
economic environment in generations. That environment is placing significant pressures on our
economy and society domestically. All over the world, governments are looking to their state
services to support and sustain quality public services, whilst containing or cutting costs. It is no
different in New Zealand. Although New Zealand entered the global economic downturn with a
stronger financial position than most OECD countries and has weathered the storm better than
many, we face essentially the same imperatives for fiscal consolidation, service realignment,
and an economic recovery that will deliver jobs and growth. The adjustment process is already
well underway in New Zealand, reflecting the work of many individuals. But more will need to
be done to lift economic performance, and to reduce the cost of the public service, by improving
the system’s efficiency and effectiveness – in short to do more and better with less.
Quite apart from the economic, fiscal and debt imperatives, citizens are expecting better public
services, delivered to them in more immediate, responsive and flexible ways. New Zealanders
and their representatives in Parliament are looking to gain better traction on the thorniest issues
that constrain our living standards, our export performance, our levels of educational attainment,
the safety of our children, and the management and protection of our natural environment.
Against most international benchmarks New Zealand has well-regarded state services 1 . They
tend to respond reasonably well to Ministers’ needs, provide reasonable services to citizens, are
trusted to be impartial and ethical. To a large extent, they have shown they can step up to the
mark in times of crisis such as immediately after a natural disaster.
But maintaining reasonable standards is no longer good enough – if ever it was - in light of the
scale of the challenges before us. The evidence is that, notwithstanding the quality and
commitment of New Zealand’s public servants, they have been working in a system that has not
brought out their best. New Zealand’s state services are some way from being the best in the
class. We can and must do better.
The good news is that the actions needed to make significant improvements are clear. Change
is needed to:
• manage the state agencies that provide or fund services less as a collection of
individual agencies, in pursuit of their own singular objectives, and more as a system
that is focused on the results that will have the biggest positive impact on
New Zealanders’ lives
1
See, for instance, New Zealand performance in the KPMG report, Benchmarking Australian Government
Administration Performance, November 2009.
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