The Administrative Review Tribunal Bill represents a dramatic improvement on the politicised appointments process that undermined trust in and the operations of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. However, in this submission, the Australia Institute argues that further changes are needed to ensure that appointments to the ART are open and free from political influence.

The investigation followed a 2022 referral alleging that the public service had been “stacked” with party operatives. The investigation did not find evidence of this but did, however, find the public sector had been politicised in other, equally pervasive ways.

An emerging challenge to good government, liberal democracy and the Australian way of life is the increasing ‘politicisation’ of our system of government. The author of this paper argues that until the breadth and depth of ‘politicisation’ is recognised, it can never be properly addressed.

Ministers make appointments to powerful roles across the public sector. These can be controversial, so ensuring a high calibre of appointees is important. This report responds to concerns about the appointments process – and standards in public life generally – by proposing reforms to restore confidence in public appointees.

Public servants and the general public should be able to have confidence that public service appointments are made based on merit. This report seeks to address specific problems arising in two recent recruitment processes, as well as making recommendations for system-wide change to bolster the arrangements for public service appointments and rebuild confidence in these...