Bridget McKenzie grills APSC on grad training | The Canberra Times | October 24, 2023 - video Dailymotion

The Canberra Times

Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie raises questions about how junior public servants are trained after allegations of a degrading list written by male Infrastructure department graduates.

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00:00 Did you ring Jim Betts? I speak to Mr. Betts around a range of things.

00:05 No, no, no, let's not be cute about this. No, no, I didn't speak to him about this one.

00:09 Right, why? It's hardly an everyday occurrence. No, it's not, but I hear a lot of things,

00:16 there are a lot of things going on in the public service and I don't speak to every

00:19 Secretary when I hear something. This is a serious matter and what I'd like to say is

00:26 one way we can get to this is through the APS Census and we can look at graduate experience.

00:33 With respect, meanwhile, a cohort of graduate women is working with a cohort of graduate boys

00:44 and being demeaned and knowing that that's being shared. So for you to say we can deal with it in

00:53 the Census, which is going to be not published until the end of November and then we'll have

00:57 a hundred working groups and blah, blah, blah, meanwhile their graduate year will be over.

01:01 And what a despicable experience they will have had in the Australian public service, because

01:09 this is a serious thing. It is despicable and I agree with Senator.

01:15 Well, you learnt about it and you didn't pick up the phone to the Secretary.

01:20 The Minister also wants to respond.

01:22 Well, I just want to add, I became aware of this yesterday after you raised it at Estimates,

01:29 as did the Minister King. She and I spoke and in fact we spoke yesterday afternoon about the

01:36 experience of the women involved. And I know she's working with her Secretary around some

01:44 undertakings about the support already being provided, but how they feel currently in light

01:54 of the fact this has been raised pretty publicly, which I'm not criticising.

01:59 I think everyone's trying to be very sensitive to that issue.

02:02 Yeah, yeah. But I think what I learnt yesterday has raised some issues around the graduate

02:08 program and I think they're probably, whether it's the APSC's responsibility or through PM&C

02:16 about ensuring some standardisation where we can, including in the intake,

02:24 that as much as possible it is a 50/50 gender split.

02:29 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Bridget McKenzie grills APSC on grad training | The Canberra Times | October 24, 2023

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