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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-12-02 Daily Xml
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SELECT COMMITTEE ON TAX-PAYER FUNDED GOVERNMENT ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS

The Hon. M. PARNELL (19:48): I move:

That the report of the select committee be noted.

Before I move to comment briefly on the contents of this report, at the outset, I acknowledge my appreciation of the members of the Legislative Council who served on this committee: the Hons Ian Hunter, Michelle Lensink, Rob Lucas and Carmel Zollo. I also acknowledge the assistance that was given by the secretary of the committee, Mr Anthony Beasley. I note that this was the first report that Mr Beasley has seen through to completion, and I am very happy to report that every 't' was crossed and every 'i' was dotted and a very professional job done. So, thank you to Mr Beasley.

I also thank the research officer to the committee, Ms Anne Melrose, who did an incredibly thorough job in pulling together a great deal of material from South Australia, other states and even overseas. Her professional research skills have helped put together a comprehensive report, which I think will serve other jurisdictions well if they also look at this question of government advertising. I also thank the organisations and individuals who made submissions, as well as those who gave direct evidence to the committee.

When I moved for this committee to be established earlier this year, I declared that it was my intention that it would be a short, sharp and shiny committee, and that we would get down to business quickly and produce our report before the end of the year, and I am very pleased that the committee has done that.

The origin of this committee, as members would know, is the increasing concern in the community about the quantity and, I think, the quality of government advertising campaigns and, in particular, the increasing use of public funds to run advertising campaigns which have no or little community benefit and which are, in fact, designed to be purely partisan for the benefit of the party in office. The examples that led to this concern included things such as advertising for the state budget and also advertising around the proposed new Royal Adelaide Hospital.

What I think the committee did very well in its deliberation was to consider the question of the distinction between what were called 'campaign ads' and the more functional ads which are generally not exceptional and which rarely attract criticism. By 'functional ads' we are talking about advertisements for jobs, advertisements for tenders and statutory public notices, those sorts of things.

The main controversy and the main waste of taxpayers' money, as the majority of the committee saw it, were in the so-called campaign ads. It seems that traditionally access to a war chest of public funds for advertising has been regarded as one of the spoils or privileges of office. The committee, when considering this question of what checks and balances should exist on the government in the use of these funds, came down clearly on the side of more checks and balances being needed.

Aside from the government members, the committee's majority recommendations I supported fully. I did also add some additional recommendations of my own as the Chairperson, which basically revolve around some more detailed finetuning of the government advertising policy and guidelines.

In particular, I was keen to see some of the objectives that were most commonly abused removed from those guidelines, and they were objectives such as raising awareness of a planned or impending initiative and reporting on performance in relation to government undertakings. I believe that those objectives are far too broad and have led directly to many of the abuses the committee found.

I also believe that the guidelines need to be amended to make sure that, before taxpayers' funds are spent, the government fully explores opportunities for unpaid media attention; for example, that the merits of a state budget are well and truly covered by the general news and current affairs reporting around budget time.

We do not need to be spending millions of dollars of taxpayers' money promoting the benefits of a budget. That, of course, is to be distinguished from particular services that might come out of a budget where, of course, the public does need to know its rights, obligations or any new services that it might be able to access.

I will not got through all the majority recommendations of the committee. I guess there are probably two that I think are fundamentally important. The first one is that we have recommended that changes to the approval for government advertising campaigns should remain in the administrative realm rather than needing to be legislated.

We have suggested that we give the government (which ever party it is) another two years to see whether changes have been effective and, after that, we may or may not need to go down the legislative path. The advertising policies and guidelines turned out to be more difficult to access than they should have been. One of our recommendations is that they be freely available on request and published on the internet. It seems that, apart from some of the basic documents, much of the detail was contained in documents that required passwords and log-ons to be able to access them.

The second and probably the most important of our recommendations is that we believe that for public accountability to be improved we need a new review and approval procedure. That procedure should involve the Auditor-General and it should cover all government advertising campaigns with a total cost in excess of $50,000. We note in making that recommendation that it is similar to the new model that was adopted in 2008 at the commonwealth level.

It is worth making the point that the final decision on whether or not to proceed with an advertising campaign would still remain with the minister for the department or agency involved, but if the Auditor-General's assessment is that the advertising campaign is not compliant then that fact must be published so that all can see that the guidelines are not being complied with.

The committee took a great deal of evidence about the total cost of government advertising, and what we found was that the published costs were a gross underestimate of the amount spent. The main reason for that was that the disclosed cost was nearly always limited to the buy-in of advertising; in other words, the space on television, radio or in a newspaper. Clearly, the cost of government advertising is broader than that, and we have recommended that other identifiable expenses incurred in the production, development and evaluation of advertising should also be included.

We noted that, when one looks at all the costs of government advertising, it is likely in the current year (2009) to be as high as $60 million. That is an incredible amount of money to be spending on government advertising, particularly as much of that advertising, in the view of some members of the committee, was inappropriate. So, we have recommended that the total cost be reduced by $20 million per year.

Finally, one of our conclusions—and it is an important one and it arises solely because the committee was established and doing its work—was the discovery that 24 advertising campaigns in the past three years did not comply with the government's own guidelines. These breaches were identified only as a result of the committee's work; there was no other way that they would have seen light of day. We can only say thank goodness for the Legislative Council. If we had not set up this committee and if we had not investigated campaigns over the last few years we would not have uncovered this gross breach of the government's own standards.

I guess you could also say that, even before we had reported, the committee's work was bringing results. We note that the Premier moved to ban the faces and voices of his ministers on government advertising and, no doubt, that decision was made very much in the shadow of this committee.

I think the committee has done good work. We have brought things into the light that were previously in the dark and we have already achieved some small changes. With those brief words, I commend the committee's report to the council.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (19:59): I rise to support the remarks made by the Hon. Mr Parnell, who chaired the committee. I join with him in thanking other members who served on the committee and the staff members who worked hard to service the committee.

The Hon. Mr Parnell has summarised the major elements of the report, and I will make some brief comments. The model that has been recommended by the majority of members of the committee is essentially based on the model that the current federal Labor government has introduced. It is a model which involves the Auditor-General and the National Audit Office. Representatives from the National Audit Office provided evidence to the committee. Essentially, their evidence can be summarised as 'the scheme operates relatively well'. It is not an expensive scheme to conduct. The report includes their estimate—which escapes me at present—of what it costs at the federal level. It is not an extraordinarily expensive policy innovation at the national level, and it should not be any more than that particular cost at the state level.

There is an interesting question in relation to it, and in our recommendations it involves campaigns above $50,000. As the Hon. Mr Parnell indicated, ultimately the government and the minister will make a decision as to whether or not to go ahead, but I guess it would be an extraordinarily courageous decision for a government or minister to proceed with a campaign if the state's Auditor-General has reported on that proposed campaign and said that it does not comply with the advertising guidelines; and the minister or the government then proceeded to go ahead with that taxpayer-funded campaign, anyway.

At the federal level, as I understand the evidence, where the National Audit Office has raised concerns, either the campaign has been changed or it has not proceeded. It is a model which is in action in the Australian political circumstance. It has been introduced by a government of the same political flavour and persuasion as the current government in South Australia. The majority of the committee, albeit opposed by government members, believes that it merits not only consideration but also introduction into our circumstances here in South Australia.

The other aspect briefly referred to by the Hon. Mr Parnell was the total expenditure on government advertising. I am not sure whether he mentioned the figure, but a broad estimate is that potentially about $60 million a year is being spent on government advertising. The committee acknowledges that a reasonable percentage of that is entirely defensible. Spending on important programs is not in the contentious or controversial area at all, but the committee is recommending that a significant reduction could be achieved easily in terms of total spending—at least $20 million.

Certainly, I am delighted that the Liberal leader Isobel Redmond in the package of visionary policies she has announced already in the lead-up to the March 2010 election has already committed to slashing government advertising by at least $20 million—which, on the evidence provided to the committee, should be relatively easily and quickly achieved by any government prepared to take the hard decisions in relation to government advertising.

The only other point is that we are seeing, and we will continue to see over the coming months, a saturation of government-funded advertising campaigns. One of the documents that has been tabled with the select committee report is dated 14 October from Mr Mark Clemow to the committee secretary. The document outlines the current programs which have been approved and those which may be running over the period leading up to March next year.

The Water for Good campaign has a total budget of just over $2 million. We are being inundated already with television commercials for that campaign as we lead into the election. Some of those commercials are congratulating the government on the decision that it eventually took in relation to a desalination plant here in South Australia. There is the perfect example of the decision already having been taken. It certainly cannot be indicated that it is providing additional or important information to South Australians—unlike, for example, a campaign which may be advertising changed watering times and those sorts of things where there may well be some defence for providing that sort of information to the electorate. But, certainly, patting yourself on the back for having decided to spend $1 billion-plus on a desal plant is an entirely different form of government advertising.

So we see that is in the field already, but there are many other very significant campaigns. I think there is one from the motor sport board involving almost $2 million, most of which will be in this period leading up to the event in March of next year. I am sure there will be lots of feel-good television advertising, either directly or indirectly, patting the government on the back for the big car race in March of next year.

There is a very significant campaign from the South Australia Tourism Commission in relation to intrastate marketing. We have not seen that particular campaign yet to see whether or not it crosses the line in terms of genuinely providing information to the electorate or indirectly trying to pat the government on the back for its policies relating to the tourism area.

There are literally dozens and dozens of other campaigns. DTED has a careers promotion campaign running from early 2009 to late 2010 with a proposed budget of $2.5 million. How much of that is going to be expended in this period leading up to the state election in March next year one can only surmise. We know there is a continuation of a budget which relates to the new rail yards hospital and other health-related reforms: we know a good percentage of that budget is going to be expended between now and the next election.

I indicate to members that there are many campaigns outlined in that document, and I think there is another document of a similar nature that has been tabled also from the Department of the Premier and Cabinet that outlines, as I said, the significant number of campaigns either running or proposed to run in the period between now and the March election next year. Look out, people of South Australia, for the saturation television coverage from the government!

The point I make is that I think the Hon. Mr Parnell referred to the fact that, as a result of the committee, the government announced some changes to its policies, although I do not think they have yet translated into changes to guidelines. One of those was to take the face of the politician off the television commercial, the politician's voice out of the radio commercial, or the politician's photo out of the newspaper ad. That is certainly a change that the opposition supports and, I suspect, all members of the committee supported.

But I give a word of caution: that, and that alone, does not ensure that there is politically unbiased government advertising. I instance just two examples. The rail yards hospital television commercials did not involve the Premier but involved health professionals, specifically selected, who put the government's line in relation to that hospital. So there you have a clear choice for the people of South Australia at the March 2010 election and the government is using taxpayer-funded advertising to support its line. It does not include the Premier in those particular ads but, nevertheless, it has health professionals putting the government's line in relation to the rail yard hospital.

Similarly, for those who can remember, there have been commercials in relation to the defence area—the destroyer project for example—which congratulated South Australia on winning that particular project. Again, that was a needless waste of taxpayers' money because, in essence, the decision had been taken by the federal government and it was just South Australian taxpayers' money congratulating South Australia on having been given the decision by the federal government.

That is a perfect example of an ad which need not involve the Premier of the state but, nevertheless, is endorsing the political message that the incumbent government is trying to put in relation to a political issue. So, the mere fact of taking politicians out of government advertising does not, of itself, guarantee that there will be non-partisan government advertising.

The final point I make is that the committee had looked at another model—the Ontario model. I indicated to the council that, a number of years ago, I visited Ontario and one of the things that I did was to have discussions with their audit officers because they have the next step up from the federal government model. That is a model where the auditor-general actually makes the final decision, not as in the federal model and what is recommended here, where the auditor-general looks at it and gives advice as to whether it is consistent with guidelines. In Ontario the auditor-general's office looks at the campaign and it is the final decision-maker. It either says it can go ahead or it cannot. A minister is unable to proceed without the approval and authorisation of the auditor-general.

I guess that is the next step. It is not yet in any Australian jurisdiction. It is something which is, according to the Canadians, working well in Ontario but, at this stage, it is not a model that has been recommended by the majority of the report. With that, I recommend the report to members. I believe that if some of these initiatives are introduced we will certainly have a more defensible and transparent model for the oversight of government advertising in South Australia.

The Hon. CARMEL ZOLLO (20:12): Initially, I was not going to speak on this report but, given that we may well note it, I thought I had better place some comments on the record. I think the work of most select committees can best be summarised by the comments made by the Hon. Bernie Finnigan earlier this afternoon when he said that they are, for the most part, the creation by Independents and the opposition for media opportunity. Some opposite—

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins interjecting:

The Hon. CARMEL ZOLLO: I said 'most'. You did not listen. I said 'most'. Whilst honourable members opposite might not like to hear that, I do believe that is the case. The Hon. Ian Hunter and I produced a dissenting statement which is attached to the report. However, as I said, it is appropriate to make a few comments. We commence the statement by saying that, whilst we are happy to associate ourselves with the parts of the report which relate to the evidence received by the select committee, we dissent from the recommendations made by the majority and make alternative recommendations—which I will speak to later.

The Hon. Ian Hunter and I then noted the recent changes to the guidelines announced by the Premier which will strengthen the approval process for government advertising. The government has already strengthened what was a very good process for the approval of advertising by government agencies to ensure that responsibilities are fulfilled in an appropriate manner.

Our guidelines are strong in this state and, if I may, I would like to go to the report and highlight some of the information that is contained in it. The current situation in South Australia is that the South Australian government proactively manages and provides oversight of all government advertising activity through a range of policies and guidelines. These formal guidelines on government advertising were initiated and implemented in 2005 under the first term of this government.

In August 2009, the Premier of South Australia, the Hon. Mike Rann, announced new rules banning politicians from appearing in state government television and radio advertising. The Premier also announced the strengthening of the Premier's Communications Advisory Group (PCAG) by having the group chaired by the Deputy Chief Executive of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet and having membership increased from six to eight, including an internal auditor and a peer expert. Reporting of all government funded advertising campaigns is to be placed in the DPC annual report, and the Auditor-General will be invited to conduct an annual review of all major campaign activity, with any report being tabled in parliament.

Under the underpinning principles, the South Australian government advertising guidelines provide that all members of the public have the right to equal access to information. Public funds may legitimately be used for information or education programs that explain the government's policies, programs or services or that inform members of the public of their obligations, rights and entitlements.

Under the use of public funds, I will just place on record a couple of appropriate guidelines. They are to maximise compliance with the law, to ensure public safety and personal security or encourage responsible behaviour. The strong role of the Premier's Communications Advisory Group is clearly outlined in this report as well. In relation to reporting compliance, there is a requirement under the current South Australian guidelines for information relating to government funded advertising campaigns to be included in the annual report of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet. Expenditure on advertising campaigns across government is also to be included in this report.

In relation to comparisons of South Australian arrangements with other jurisdictions, in no Australian jurisdiction are these guidelines legislated, despite various attempts in a number of jurisdictions to do so. The Hon. Mark Parnell has already mentioned that. In all instances, the guidelines are administrative ones. While the fundamental principles and underlying objectives of advertising in each jurisdiction are comparable, the approval process varies in the jurisdictions.

In relation to the approving body, the review or the evaluation, South Australia is the only state to have evaluation built into the approval process. That is, as part of the approval process, South Australian government agencies are required or mandated to identify prior to approval being given how the effectiveness of the campaign will be evaluated and to report how well it achieved the desired outcomes after the campaign has been run. The Auditor-General of South Australia has the power to review advertising campaigns approved under the PCAG approval process, and the South Australian Auditor-General reviewed five campaigns during 2009.

In relation to the scope of advertising, the South Australian guidelines outline what is appropriate and inappropriate use of public funds. In relation to the role of the Auditor-General, the committee drew on a published article by Ms Young, from memory. I cannot see her given name. The article states:

These are not matters that the Auditor-General has the mandate to resolve; rather, this is a matter for parliament. It is not the role of the Auditor-General to directly hold the government to account. This is the role of parliament and, ultimately, of the people.

An additional point made by Ms Young in her article relates to the perceived increasing politicisation of the Public Service. She notes:

The position of the Auditor-General...needs to be considered in the context of the concerns not only about the politicisation of the debate...but also the politicisation of the Public Service.

In relation to the use of government members' faces and voices, we have heard already that the Premier made an announcement. In August 2009, the Premier of South Australia, the Hon. Mike Rann, banned the use of the face, image and voice of the Premier and his ministers in radio and television advertising.

That message was then further clarified that the Premier had expanded the ban on politicians appearing in radio and television advertising to all forms of advertising, including any functional or brand advertising in print. I have to say that I think that, if we left it up to the Hon. Mark Parnell, he would probably remove even the faces of the poor ministers on their websites.

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. CARMEL ZOLLO: Well, he's such a purist. I am really quite amazed at his passion to see the removal of any political face from any landscape. As I have just mentioned, I have already placed on the record the political comments made by Ms Young, and her comments are further strengthened by others. As we say in our dissenting statement, we do not support the need for recommendations for further defining the role of the Auditor-General. The Auditor-General already has the power to investigate these matters, and we would not want to restrict his broad current powers in any way.

Claims of abuse of the guidelines for political purposes are as predictable as they are unsubstantiated and generally arise some time prior to elections in pursuit of political gain—and, of course, we are at that time in our electoral cycle. Comments by the Victorian Auditor-General on this matter we have said should also be noted.

Making assessments of campaigns or campaign material, and whether or not they contain material that is party political, is a matter of judgment. The assessments need, as much as possible, to be objective and not swayed by the public debate. Judgments, by their nature, can be difficult and can at times be a matter of fine balance and open to interpretation.

The Hon. Ian Hunter and I go on to say that we do not support the recommendations mandating a reduction in advertising. We believe that it is a blatant political ploy just weeks out from an election, and we reject the attempt to turn this committee's report into electioneering propaganda, which is what has actually happened.

Since this committee was formed, comments have been made by members of parliament advocating or proposing the cessation of government advertising in order to fund other programs or projects—and, from memory, I think that occurred about a month ago. These comments demonstrate a lack of understanding of the role and importance of government advertising. The view that all government advertising can be abandoned or severely curtailed prioritises cost over the community value of campaigns and the importance of specific messages.

We go on to say that it is very easy to make these empty promises; it is much harder to do when faced with the reality of the need to advertise campaigns, such as road safety (something I well know as the former minister for road safety), occupational health and safety, bush safety and alcohol awareness. Where would we be without those public education campaigns?

It would also impact functional advertising for recruitment of doctors, nurses and police and in others areas, including promoting TAFE courses for trade training, and other important public information. Important industry and product promotion campaigns, such as tourism and lotteries, would also be adversely affected.

One might well ask: where has the $20 million reduction recommended in this report come from? I believe it may well have been the Hon. Rob Lucas who came up with the figure, but obviously they all signed their name to it; others say that it was plucked out of thin air. I think that it was plucked out of thin air to help the Liberals balance their election promises and that it is nothing more than that.

I really need to place on the record the importance of functional advertising for the many departments. Indeed, I also make the comment that some newspapers in South Australia would perhaps be so much the poorer if we were to remove the very important functional advertising that is the business of government. Our recommendations are:

1. That an annual report be prepared by the Department of the Premier and Cabinet to report on South Australian government advertising activities;

2. That the report be tabled in parliament as part of the annual reporting process;

3. That the report includes a summary of details of overall expenditure, expenditure by agency, expenditure by type (both campaign and functional), expenditure by media, expenditure by ethnic and non-English speaking media, complaints and comments; and

4. That those agencies be required to report advertising activities in their annual reports, including details of production, media placement, and research and evaluation activities; and that those agencies be required to report these details to the Department of the Premier and Cabinet at six monthly intervals.

While we do not agree with the recommendations that the majority of the committee signed, nonetheless I recognise the important body of work that was undertaken by the staff. I take this opportunity to thank the secretary of the committee, Mr Anthony Beasley, and the research officer, Anne Melrose.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. I.K. Hunter.

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