Tasmania currently spends a high percentage of its budget on public sector jobs and services. As purse strings tighten in a challenging fiscal environment, difficult questions arise about return on that investment. Do we need fewer public servants and publicly-funded services, or simply better ones? What are our obligations and options when we spend public money?
The role, responsibility and relevance of public service – and the real implications for public servants and the wider community – will be explored in the first Denison Debate for 2012 on Wednesday 28 March, 6:00 – 7:30 pm in the Stanley Burbury Theatre, Sandy Bay campus of the University of Tasmania.
The topic will be ‘Frank, Fearless or Forgotten? The Role of Public Service Today.’ Associate Professor Natasha Cica, Director of the Inglis Clark Centre for Civil Society, will be in conversation with:
• Professor Sir Ian Kennedy, Chair, Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, UK and Emeritus Professor of Health Law, Ethics & Policy at University College London
• Mr Rhys Edwards, Secretary, Department of Premier and Cabinet
• Professor David Adams, Social Inclusion Commissioner
This will be the key event in the March 2012 visit to Tasmania by Professor Sir Ian Kennedy, as a Visiting Fellow at the University of Tasmania. For more information about Sir Ian and his full public seminar programme see http://www.events.utas.edu.au/2012/march/denison-debate/sir-ian-kennedy/.
All are welcome to attend this event.
Sir Ian Kennedy’s visit is hosted by the Inglis Clark Centre and is supported by the Office of the Provost, the Faculty of Law and the Faculty of Arts at the University of Tasmania, with the HC Coombs Policy Forum at the Australian National University.
Dr Natasha Cica Director Inglis Clark Centre for Civil Society University of Tasmania
