Transparency International New Zealand regularly runs Leaders Integrity Forums on issues relating to transparency, accountability, corruption-prevention and integrity. A number of times a year, public sector leaders gather at these forums.
Useful Signals or Cheap Talk - Strategising with Integrity
At our September Leaders Integrity Forum Geoff Cooper, Chief Executive of Te Waihanga - the Infrastructure Commission and Prof Jonathan Boston, Chair of the School of Government, VUW talked about smart long term planning to make the best use of public investment. The session was chaired by Derek Gill, TINZ Board Director who has decades of experience in public leadership and public finance.
New Zealand’s challenge is how to maximise the long-term benefit of public spending on infrastructure. Infrastructure includes many elements such as management of water, power and land, roads, technology, public services and human resources. Planning is further challenged by our geography, generating population demographic changes, natural hazards and climate change.
In New Zealand, the spend on maintaining current infrastructure takes up a substantial proportion of our infrastructure spending, so we need to ensure that new investment is carefully thought through including its long term implications and benefits. Te Waihanga have looked backward and forward on New Zealand’s infrastructure spending over many years and compared it to other countries. Te Waihanga has then developed tools such as the Infrastructure Prioritisation tool and the National Infrastructure Pipeline and Workforce projections to assist policy makers, investors and planners. That leads to overall planning that puts a fuller picture in front of decisionmakers including politicians.
Jonathan Boston reflected on the need to protect the interests of future generations, in a world dominated by short-term political imperatives, democratic myopia and impatient voters. How can democratic systems better tackle what Tom Hale calls ‘long problems’?
Addressing these problems is frustrated by under-investment or poor regulation that is unclear to the public or significant uncertainty over the net benefits or visibility of near-term benefits of government action; or where substantial near-term costs are borne by powerful groups.
Getting cross-party agreement on long-term strategies for public investment (or regulation) requires quality independent advice; good public information, engagement and debate; transparency and accountability mechanisms and independent monitoring.
Building integrity infrastructure for modern government
Integrity in public life is often described as a value or principle. At the Transparency International New Zealand Leaders Integrity Forum in August, public service senior leaders were challenged to think of it in a different way: framing integrity as infrastructure – the systems, institutions, and safeguards that uphold and maintain trust.
Chaired by Andrew McConnell (Deputy Auditor-General), the session featured Commissioner Paul Brereton of Australia’s National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC), who drew on the Commission’s first two years of operation to illustrate the idea that framing integrity as infrastructure highlights that it doesn’t happen automatically. It requires institutional design, planning, and resourcing, and it can degrade if left unattended.
While not critical of the systems in place in New Zealand, progress being made in Australia highlights the need for a centralized anti-corruption mechanism in New Zealand.
See Building integrity infrastructure for modern government blog on the OAG website.
The protected disclosure paradox
At the Transparency International New Zealand Leaders Integrity Forum in June, public service leaders confronted a puzzling reality; more New Zealanders than ever understand their rights to report serious wrongdoing, yet nearly half still don't feel safe doing so.
The session brought together Emma Leach, Senior Assistant Ombudsman at the Office of the Ombudsman, and Hugo Vitalis, Deputy Chief Executive at Te Kawa Mataaho Public Service Commission, to explore the trends and challenges facing New Zealand's protected disclosures framework.
See The protected disclosure paradox blog on the OAG website.
The Leaders Integrity Forum is organised by Transparency International New Zealand and supported by the Office of the Auditor-General. The forum provides a space for senior public sector leaders to discuss key issues affecting integrity in the public sector. It offers a unique opportunity for free and frank sharing about challenges, solutions, and good practice.
