DFAT staffing cuts — brain drain (or gain) for Australian aid?

It is less than two months before the July 1 deadline set by the Abbott government in Australia to complete the integration process of the now-defunct AusAID into the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade — a situation that, according to some insiders, could very well make or break Australian aid. While many details regarding the integration process have yet to be hashed out, DFAT has confirmed it will cut a total of about 500 staff (including former AusAID employees). Although a handful have applied for voluntary redundancies that have been received until April, uncertainty among staff remains very high. A DFAT spokesperson confirmed to Devex that around 550 employees have expressed interest in filing for voluntary redundancy since the calls opened in November 2013 — over 200 people more than the 350 figure the department initially made public in February, and 60 percent of which came from AusAID. To some, the redundancy call is a considerate move by the Abbott government. According to DFAT, however, only 36 percent will be granted full or partial redundancy packages while the rest will likely have their contracts terminated with only the severance benefits mandated by law. “It is anticipated that by 30 June 2014, approximately 200 APS staff will have left DFAT through voluntary redundancy,” the spokesperson said. “Finalizing all VR requests will continue into the first half of the 2014-15 financial year.” DFAT further explained that the calls for expression of interest in the redundancy packages closed on April 4, even if the department had previously told Devex it would “continue to make offers of voluntary redundancy until 30 June, 2014.” The Abbott government reiterated its recurring plans during the federal budget release to shave over 16,000 jobs in the country’s bureaucracy, aside from significant cuts in the foreign aid budget to gain efficiency and savings. Brain drain ... For a senior Australian aid official posted overseas, who asked to remain anonymous, the outflow of aid professionals and development practitioners from the integrated DFAT may well deflate the competency of the country’s aid program and its overarching humanitarian goals. “I suspect that many of us leaving are the most experienced development practitioners and what DFAT will be left with is an aid program run by people whose primary commitment is not to poverty reduction but to what Australia can get out of it,” the official, who also applied for VR in April, told Devex. The government’s decision to align humanitarian aid policy with national interests — including Foreign Minister Julie Bishop’s push for “aid for trade” — have been under intense scrutiny since Tony Abbott’s election in September. Several NGOs have complained this move will undermine Australia’s leading role in international development. Although reasons for redundancy applications may be wide and varied including the “obvious financial incentives for those … who have been around for a while,” the official pointed out many of her peers are disappointed at the “combination of the abolition of AusAID, the gutting of the aid program and the new national interest alignment.” Financial incentives for outgoing government employees have been under fire lately in the local development community, especially with the cuts in the budget. Paul Ronalds, head of Save the Children Australia, told Devex this should have been looked at in more detail before the government decided to chop the aid budget. “There are … many other options for savings that would have less impact on the most vulnerable and poorest families and children in Australia and overseas,” he said. “Tightening rules around fringe benefits related to cars, superannuation and negative gearing … would save billions.” … or gain? But on the opposite end of the spectrum, a former Australian aid official in the 1980s and 1990s argued the decision to integrate AusAID into DFAT may actually be a good thing, especially given the inefficiency and micromanaging issues the now-defunct aid agency has grappled with over the last few years. “Trimming the fat for Australian aid will bring with it benefits for the delivery of the overall aid programs,” Gary Andrews, now a business development director at a Malaysian firm, told Devex. “AusAID has grown significantly bigger over the past decade yet didn’t demonstrate that it had a clear vision for its own role.” Andrews explained that during his time working in the country’s aid agency and until recently where he worked for companies contracting with AusAID, inefficiency and micromanaging have resulted in a waste of time and resources. “I'm not quite sure if the organization fully understood what their role ought to be. In my view, their role is like a portfolio manager, rather than as project managers,” he explained. “Their role is to engage consulting firms to do the project management and yet they, nevertheless, must have been spending a lot of their resources in micromanaging what the consultants were doing … and second guessing everything that those organizations were contracted to do … rather than being fully focused on the whole country portfolio.” This decision, albeit harsh according to some, may force DFAT and the Abbott government to reflect on what needs to be done and how to move forward from here, Andrews explained, notwithstanding the strong possibility that many of those laid off may actually be absorbed by local and international NGOs aware of their skills and expertise. “[It] will demand a reexamination of how Australian aid delivery is best managed. It will force aid managers to prioritize their role and ultimately lead them to put into practice what were only rhetorical aspirations within AusAID, namely a teamwork approach with the whole aid community that allows each of the stakeholders to get on with what they do best.” Read more development aid news online, and subscribe to The Development Newswire to receive top international development headlines from the world’s leading donors, news sources and opinion leaders — emailed to you FREE every business day. See more: NGOs dismayed over 'broken promises' on Australian aid The foreign aid program that Australia 'can afford' — DFAT Disappointed NGOs slam Australia's aid cut details