Community Services in Victoria: where are we headed ?? Agency and workforce development forum Jasper Hotel 6 December 2012.

Community Services in Victoria: where are we headed ??

Agency and workforce development forumJasper Hotel

6 December 2012

Victoria has three major reform processes underway in the community sector

• Human Services systems reform • Business process reform in government

service delivery arms and• Whole of community sector reform

Community services will be required to juggle the 3 reform processes

The reforms will interact

Change in government service systems

Broad overview of the service sectorreforms implicit inthe reports and papers…

• Comprehensive and strategic

• Whole-of-government objectives are ambitious and forward-thinking

• There are subtle and not-so-subtle potential game-changers

• Overall management of the tension between being prescriptive and enabling

• Cross overs with reform agendas in other sectors: community mental health, housing, drug and alcohol, family violence, child and family services etc.

Connolly, Marie (2012), Analysis of Protecting Victoria’s Vulnerable Children Inquiry, Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, (unpublished)

The Government/Community Services relationship…

“…this strategic relationship needs to be long term and based on an explicit understanding of the respective and different responsibilities and roles of government and the community sector”

(PVVC 2012, p. 435)

Strategic collaboration…

How can we understand the agenda...

Governance monitoring & accountability

• Establishing and strengthening

• Performance framework

• Governance monitoring accountability

• Accountability systems

• Training, support and development

Development of Services

• Population-based approaches

• Area-based approaches

• Responses to our most vulnerable

• Integrated service provision

• Child centred family focus

• Collaborative approaches

• Legal Responses

Capacity of Community Service Organisations

“a ... more pro-active role” for Government aimed at improving the overall structure and capacity of CSOs (Cummins et al. 2012, 441).3 elements of capacity identified

•Governance•Quality: able to evidence outcomes•Financial viability in community service organisations

Accountability and TransparencyStrengthening data collection

Enhancing IT effectiveness

Collecting data to inform improvements and changes

Outcomes evidence: capacity to engage in research

Performance measures and indicatorsEvidence of greater participation in services (in service design and governance)

Build capacity to demonstrate links between services and with other providers – collaboration at the local level

Accountability systemsRegistration, Department of Human Services Standards: external audits

Review: Children’s Commissioner new regulatory functions

ACNC: legislation for Australian Government registration and governance review of CSOs December 2012

Victoria has committed to whole sector community sector reform

Vertigan Review of State Government finances

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/secret-government-plan-to-end-big-bureaucracy/story-e6frgczx-1226459386354 see also Whelan, James (2012) ‘Big Society’: How the UK Government is dismantling the state and what it means for Australia, Centre for Policy Development, Haymarket, New South Wales

Victoria has committed to whole sector community sector reform

Better Services Implementation Taskforce

“Departments and service providers, both inside and outside of government, need to be accountable and must deliver results,” Mr Baillieu said.

Victoria has committed to whole sector community sector reform

What might it look like ? Lessons from other jurisdictions?Western Australia has undertaken a major system reform in their community sector….from 2010•Arising out of an economic audit process•Establishment of Partnership forum comprising ceos of agencies and senior public servants•Process led by WACOSS and senior public servants•High level political champions•Discussion paper and consultations•Partnership Forum chaired by Peter Shergold

Public policy and the relationship betweengovernment and community sector

Current key themes in public policy about the relationship between government and the community sector are:•cross-sectoral collaboration, in order to stimulate more innovative ways of developing and delivering public policy;•embracing open government, actively encouraging people to access publicly-funded data • a crowd-sourcing approach to the improvement of public programs and drafting of legislation;•experimenting in new forms of deliberative democracy, on-line or in-person;•empowering citizens to ‘co-manage’ and ‘co-produce’ the services they need •Programs which focus on more pro-social individual behaviours •catalysing additional finance from the private sector to create social impact and public benefit; and•auditing and measuring the full social, environmental and civic returns on public investment in human services. Peter Shergold at https://secure.csi.edu.au/site/Home/Blog.aspx?defaultblog=https://blog.csi.edu.au/2012/02/public-sector-innovation-the-view-from-torquay/

Opportunities and challenges?

We have a chance to…

Reinforce whole-of-government responses

Change the way we do business through family & community focus

Start measuring things that matter to the constituencies we serve (children young people families and communities)

Develop better accountability and monitoring frameworks

Develop better understandings of real cost and need

Build a workforce and organisational capacity and capability through training and system clarification and through collaboration

The challenge is to decide where to invest limited resources … and to work out smart ways of maximizing the investment

Build engagement with our communities

Change the lives of vulnerable individuals and their families

Further informationCentre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare www.cfecfw.asn.au

ReferencesCallister, Gill (2012) Service Reform- what will it mean for CSOs, presentation to the Centre for Excellence Governance Forum, Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, 3 September 2012, available at Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, 2012, Position Statement: Sharing social responsibility- a position statement in response to the Victorian agenda for vulnerable children and their families, Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, Melbourne.Connolly, Marie (2012) Analysis of the Protecting Victoria’s Vulnerable Children Inquiry, Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, unpublished.Whelan, James (2012) ‘Big Society’: How the UK Government is dismantling the state and what it means for Australia, Centre for Policy Development, Haymarket, New South Wales.Peter Shergold, 2012, Public sector innovation, accessed at https://secure.csi.edu.au/site/Home/Blog.aspx?defaultblog=https://blog.csi.edu.au/2012/02/public-sector-innovation-the-view-from-torquay/