The Commonwealth has both a legal and moral obligation to ensure it provides health and wellness services with a doctor to all those who work in Parliament House, a former bureaucrat and accountability campaigner says.
Steve Davies is a public service veteran with more than three decades working across federal and state governments. He has had a career-long concern about improving public service culture and whistleblower protections.
In the past, Davies has called on the public service to use occasions such as R U OK Day to reflect on how to better treat whistleblowers and complainants but is now turning his attention to the “tokenistic” treatment of health service reform by the Department of Parliamentary Services.
Davies told The Mandarin that calls from Coalition Senator Jane Hume, a member of the parliamentary leadership taskforce and independent Senator David Pocock for there to be an onsite doctor to meet the needs of people working in Parliament during sitting weeks should be heeded.
Both Pocock and Hume have expressed concern that the recommendation related to establishing an onsite GP clinic is yet to be realised despite the Jenkins report being released in November 2021 and a feasibility study completed in November 2022.
The feasibility study found having a doctor onsite at Parliament House during sitting weeks would cost $361,000 a year.
Davies said a holistic health service could assist people with both physical and mental health issues, and create a workplace where individuals will be healthier, and more engaged and ensure they could make better decisions.
“Senator Hume’s support and call for the implementation of the vision of more holistic health and wellness service in Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces is highly significant as such a service would provide a tool that people can use,” said Davies, who wrote a guide on moral disengagement and the public service.
“The provision of three vending machines can only be regarded as a tokenistic response to a recommendation that demands the Parliament as a workplace engage with its people authentically and not treat them as workhorses.
“Doing so is more than a legal obligation. It’s a moral obligation.”
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