This month's federal budget made a generational investment in Australian industry and technology under the banner of a Future Made in Australia. Here's how our public service can deliver on that vision.
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Against a background of major powers staking their territory in the post-carbon global economy, the centrepiece of the 2024 budget was a suite of high-tech measures to strengthen future industries.
From AI and quantum computing to renewable energy and resources, every part of the Future Made in Australia involves the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields.
The government is also trying to rebuild its tech and engineering capability and wean itself off an unhealthy reliance on consultancies whose accounting divisions have drawn them into the public spotlight for all the wrong reasons.
These twin aims demand a sharp, sustained uplift in STEM skills across the public service. But attracting and retaining high-skilled tech and engineering professionals to the public sector is going to require overdue reforms.
This year's Employment and Remuneration Trends for Tech, Software and IT Professionals report published by Professionals Australia shows that the public sector lags other key technical areas in several ways.
![Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants to see a future built in Australia. Picture by Peter Lorimer Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants to see a future built in Australia. Picture by Peter Lorimer](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/pMXRnDj3SUU44AkPpn97sC/341890ff-88ca-468a-9f97-20b64b4fb6cc.jpg/r0_172_5536_3284_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Its survey of more than 1600 Australian tech workers, software engineers and project managers reveals a two-speed tech economy.
People working in companies like Google or Atlassian reported median base pay between $110,000 and $187,000, supplemented by near-universal stock options with an average value of $104,000.
In the previous year their wages had risen by 7 per cent.
However technical professionals in the public sector sat on base wages of $75,000 to $152,000, were seldom paid overtime or bonuses and reported a 2 per cent pay rise the year prior.
People working in the public sector were more than twice as likely to report sexual harassment, discrimination, exclusion and bullying in their workplace over the previous 24 months, with women and non-binary people experiencing these at vastly higher rates than men.
Here's what the APS can do make itself an attractive employer for technology professionals.
The first step is to establish a standalone technical and engineering classification so it can credibly participate in a competitive market for STEM skills.
Expecting large numbers of people to ignore the prospect of a six-figure bump to remain in government is unrealistic.
The second is to remove the artificial caps on staff numbers imposed by arbitrary average staffing level caps.
It is common sense that increasing capability while scaling down outsourcing requires more in-house resources.
These caps represent a bygone era when public capability was rented from global consultancies rather than owned by the public service.
We must also urgently address the culture and equity issues that are so starkly illustrated in the report. They represent a clear risk to safety and a mark against the APS as an employer of choice.
STEM fields are already male-dominated - only one in four survey participants were women, with even lower numbers in leadership roles.
Women were more likely to consider leaving their roles because of workplace or culture issues, lack of recognition or opportunity, parenthood or inflexible work practices.
Though the reported 7 per cent gender pay gap of public sector respondents was narrower than the double-digit figures in other sectors, the psychological danger experienced predominantly by women and non-binary people is deeply concerning.
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This has a direct impact on the ability of any employer to keep staff - while only 15 per cent of people who had experienced harassment or discrimination had used a formal complaints process, nearly half left the job in which it had occurred.
Addressing this STEM-wide issue requires a holistic approach that begins in primary school, continues through training and into the workplace, and making the APS leader rather than a laggard in culture and gender equity is a large piece of the solution.
A Future Made in Australia is a compelling vision. We have thriving industries, a robust university sector and potentially abundant renewable energy to power it. But without making these long overdue changes to government employment the venture could be held back by a dearth of public capability when we most need it.
- Kathleen Studdert is Australian government director at Professionals Australia.