00:00The government needs to put its money where its mouth is, there's a lot of talk of needing
00:07increased productivity across the board and securing funding for the future of publicly
00:12funded science and innovation for Australians is definitely how it should be, one of the
00:17key ways it should be done.
00:19Yeah, so for now CSIRO management has to work out what to cut so it doesn't blow the
00:24budget, how are they going about it?
00:30We are not happy and neither are the staff there on how this is being done, particularly
00:36with this latest round.
00:37I mean, we have seen during the 24-25 financial year, you know, hundreds of cuts of jobs in
00:43essential support services for frontline scientists.
00:46Now we've come to the end of that portion of it.
00:51And we're seeing, you know, Data61 that has been hollowed out by stealth over the last
00:5712 months with the loss of 20% of their staff and, you know, it's a really important component
01:03of the organisation.
01:06It powers Australia's AI and cyber future amongst, you know, a number of other, you know, really
01:10key areas of research that they embed themselves in.
01:14So what should be cut instead?
01:16Well, they need more funding and that's like, you know, maybe that's the, that's a really
01:22good question for the government.
01:23And it's also a good question for CSIRO on how they keep doing, how this is, how this
01:28is being done.
01:29They shouldn't be, the government shouldn't be saying, oh, that's CSIRO's responsibility,
01:33they're independent.
01:34And then, you know, at the same time, you can't just keep going back and forth between them.
01:38At the end of the day, it is people's jobs that are on the line.
01:43And it's key, critical science and research development that will be lost.
01:49Yeah.
01:50Because did you get the impression with this relatively new Labor government, being in one
01:56term, but after so many years of coalition government, that there was going to be a big
01:59concentration on science and research?
02:02Yes.
02:03Absolutely.
02:04And has that happened or not?
02:07I think that what has happened is it's been done at a scale and pace.
02:12These changes, the reshaping has been done at such a scale and pace.
02:17Consideration for what should stay and what should go.
02:20As we've said before, it's not a change management process.
02:23It's the problem.
02:24It's how it's done and how it's supported.
02:27And could this lead to industrial action?
02:30No.
02:32We are not in a bargaining period at this point.
02:35So, no.
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