Public service diversity bureaucracy is a taxpayer-funded vanity project

The Taxpayers’ Union says the public service should immediately freeze its expanded diversity plan until it can prove existing initiatives have delivered a single measurable benefit to taxpayers.

Taxpayers’ Union spokesperson Tory Relf said:

“MBIE has recently presided over catastrophic project failures, blown budgets and appalling financial controls. Its priority should be rebuilding competence and accountability, not commissioning more workshops on unconscious bias."

"Last month Treasury released a 'Performance Improvement Review' which exposed Treasury's decline in standards as the Government's main economic advisor. The cause is the fact Treasury has taken its focus off its core job. Diversity plans are an example of exactly that problem."

“Before spending another dollar, MBIE and Treasury must answer:

• What improvement to public service efficiency and productivity have existing DEI policies achieved?
• If this is not being measured, why not?
• How does MBIE know these initiatives provide value to the taxpayers who fund them?
• If there are no verifiable measures of value, why is MBIE expanding them?

“MBIE is asking taxpayers to bankroll an ideological agenda it cannot show has improved a single public service outcome.”

“Workshops, staff networks and feelings surveys are not public services. Taxpayers pay MBIE to deliver results, not to congratulate itself for meeting internal diversity targets.”

“The public service does not need more diversity bureaucracy. It needs fewer failures, tighter financial control and people who are competent at their jobs.”