The Productivity Commission has released a draft report on its review of progress on closing the gap. The review arises from the terms of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap, in particular, clauses 121 to 124.
There are a number of problematic issues with the draft review, and most particularly with its proposed solutions. The most fundamental is that the Productivity Commission appears to have veered away from the comprehensive review envisaged in the Agreement. Despite nearly 400 pages of investigative narration, we don’t really obtain an effective readout on the required new policy roadmap for closing the gap.
In relation to identifying the overall cost of closing the gap, including perhaps its constitutive elements, Governments have made no estimates nor commitments. It is bad enough that governments do not estimate these costs, but it is an egregious dereliction of responsibility for the ‘independent’ reviewer to ignore this issue. No other area of public policy aspiration is seriously analysed without a focus on cost.
A further issue identified by the Productivity Commission relates to the status of the targets in the Agreement. The Productivity Commission notes in its plain English summary that there are no data developed for any of the targets under the Priority Reforms; for 4 of the 19 socio-economic targets; and some 140 supporting indicators and more than 120 data development items. It also suggests that we will not see these data developed before 2030.
In other words, we have the policy architecture, but not the means to effectively implement it. In response, the Productivity Commission recommendation is for a dedicated government agency to drive data development. I beg to disagree. Instead, I suggest the Commonwealth should step in and initiate an immediate process of radical simplification to take the closing the gap process back to its core purpose.
The major problem with this draft review is that it is fundamentally misconceived, and fails to step back and look at the nation’s approach to closing the gap holistically. This was a crucial opportunity only three years into the revised process, and unfortunately, the Productivity Commission has failed to grasp it.
As a consequence, the review fails to ask the hard questions and ignores many aspects that should have been front and centre. There are mentions of jurisdictions failing to deliver on their commitments, but no real solutions offered in response. There is no analysis of the nature of the 2020 refreshed targets which are increasingly not focussed on comparative socioeconomic status, but are framed in terms of absolutes (i.e. improvements on current levels). This reconceptualisation radically undermines the notion of even seeking to close the gap. There is no analysis of the ethical and philosophical tensions between the right to equality and the right to diverse lifestyles (self-determination) that pervade the very fabric of the closing the gap policy architecture. There is a rather strange avoidance of any focus on the salience of remote disadvantage, linked to an extreme preoccupation with avoiding so called deficit discourse. Taken to its logical conclusion, this has the potential to undermine the conceptual foundations of closing the gap.
Most importantly, there is no recognition that the current design architecture for the agreement, while incomplete and thus subject to ongoing remedial work, is simultaneously over designed and in need of radical simplification. As presently configured, it guarantees that the Coalition of Peaks (representing Indigenous interests) will be wading through a labyrinth of bureaucratic sludge for the next ten years; a convenient distraction from the desperately required focus on policy innovation by all involved in public policymaking across the Indigenous policy domain. It also ensures the increasing probability of the path-breaking National Agreement imploding under the weight of its accumulated complexity. Proactive reform is preferable to stasis followed by abolition.
The bottom line is that the six recommendations of the draft review (see pages 10-15 of the review), if implemented, would in my view not make any substantive difference to the nation’s progress on closing the gap within five or even ten years. They are an amalgam of doubling down on the current hyper-complexity of the policy architecture along with a hefty dose of blind faith in the bureaucratic leadership of the nation.
Given these challenges, I have a recommendation for the Commonwealth Government. Issue the Productivity Commission with revised terms of reference, and perhaps an extension of time. Request them to (a) develop an estimate of the cost of addressing the entrenched inequality facing Indigenous Australians; (b) map out a realistic timeframe and strategy for achieving that objective; (c) make a more fundamental analysis of the current status of the Closing the Gap architecture; and (d) provide options for radically simplifying the structure and design of the current architecture while retaining the four priority reforms. And for good measure, keep it to fifty pages. Such a report would then allow the Commonwealth Government to meaningfully and honestly engage with Indigenous interests and the states and territories.
Note: this article is a cut down version of a much longer post on Michael Dillon’s A Walking Shadow August 3, 2023
: Michael Dillon
Michael Dillon is a former public servant and ministerial adviser. He is currently a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research at the ANU. His personal blog is A Walking Shadow: Observations on Indigenous Public Policy and Institutional Transparency can be read at www.refragabledelusions.blogspot.com