Governing the City State - Chief Minister and Treasury Directorate ...

of desired outcomes, and include adequate provision for external scrutiny”. 292 Suchframeworks would recognise the fact that “some public services need to be provided in anequitable and consistent way, but in delivering others, governments desire experiment andinnovation over uniformity”. 293Accountability structures in the public value paradigm require decision makers, and thosewho hold them to account, to engage with greater uncertainty, and above all, to engage withrisk management:In practice, this often means becoming an active participant in the way that problems areperceived and defined, and helping to shape expectations about acceptable tolerances forinconsistencies, mistakes and failures in how complicated problems are tackled. … while itmay not be possible (or desirable) in the new modes of control the way things are done, it ispossible to manage and mitigate the risks. 294For the ACT, with its unique city state governance arrangements, the solution to thesechallenges may well lie in “looking for different, less traditional, ways of assessingperformance and adjusting expectations of the way in which performance information shouldbe interpreted and applied.” 295 Approaches such as benchmarking and genuine evaluationprocesses are better suited to services delivered through networks and partnerships but:The greatest challenge and perhaps most radical way of reforming accountabilityarrangements to support new ways of working would be the transition to anaccountability framework that acknowledges the pressures for shared decisionmakingpower and funding authority through the development of collective296accountability for joint governance.In this context, Anglicare Canberra and Goulburn notes in its Submission:Greater responsibility of the service providers to achieve outcomes should beaccompanied by a greater attempt to define and measure outcomes/impacts for theACT community … this will require greater capability in the service delivery entities(public, private, community sector) to deliver outcomes and to undertake continuousimprovement, risk management and reflective practice. 297Mr Jim Grenfell similarly noted:Significant effort has been expended on developing individual processes to achieveresults. Much of this effort has been directed towards meeting accountabilityrequirements. There is scope for redirecting effort more towards meeting the primaryobjectives rather than focussing on process as such”. 298292 Australian Public Service Commission (2009c) p.18.293 Australian Public Service Commission (2009b) p.11.294 Australian Public Service Commission (2009b) p.36.295 Australian Public Service Commission (2009b) p.41.296 Australian Public Service Commission (2009b) pp.47,48.297 Submission No.2.298 Submission No.12.Strategy, Resource Allocation and the Vacant Middle Ground: 227