Australian Multiculturalism for a New Century: Towards Inclusiveness
Appendix G - Charter Of Public Service in a Culturally Diverse Society
Foreword
I am pleased to present the Commonwealth's Charter of Public Service in a Culturally Diverse Society.
This Charter integrates a set of service principles concerning cultural diversity into mainstream service planning, delivery, evaluation and outcomes reporting.
The development of the Charter has been consistent with the Government's commitment to implement a Federal access and equity strategy in consultation with other levels of government. The Charter has been endorsed by Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments and by the Australian Local Government Association, and so represents a nationally consistent approach to the delivery of culturally responsive government services.
Most jurisdictions are already pursuing policies and programs consistent with the Charter. At the Commonwealth level there has been considerable progress in ensuring that mainstream government services are planned and delivered with cultural diversity considerations in mind. The result is that services are better able to meet the needs of all Australians.
This commitment to providing responsive and inclusive services is at the heart of the Government's public service reform agenda. The Charter is, therefore, related to other initiatives on Government Service Charters, Workplace Diversity and Productive Diversity.
I recommend that all government officials and others involved in the design and delivery of government services to the community become familiar with this document. It provides a key tool for ensuring all government services meet the needs of our culturally and linguistically diverse society.
Philip Ruddock
Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs
June 1998
Introduction
Access and equity policies aim to ensure that government services meet the needs of people from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds so that they can participate fully in economic, social and cultural life. The importance of these policies has been recognised at Commonwealth, State/Territory and Local Government levels.
The Steering Committee for the Review of Commonwealth/State Service Provision has considered performance indicators which, amongst other things, reflect access and equity components of service delivery. In 1995, the Council of Ministers for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs agreed that increased efforts in access and equity were required by Australian governments.
Establishing a Framework for Best Practice in Culturally Responsive Service Delivery
A principal reform objective in OECD countries is to strengthen a customer-service orientation in public institutions. Charters of customer service provide a clear framework against which the effectiveness of service delivery can be monitored. They have been developed by private sector organisations, and Government Service Charters are being adopted in the public sector.
The Commonwealth access and equity strategy is being expressed in terms of this Charter of Public Service in a Culturally Diverse Society, aimed at ensuring government services meet the particular needs of users and achieve intended outcomes for them. In a culturally diverse society like Australia it means making services culturally appropriate, accessible, consumer-oriented and effective.
Charter of Public Service in a Culturally Diverse Society
The Charter of Public Service in a Culturally Diverse Society represents a new approach to access and equity.
Too often access and equity have been an after-thought, an add on if service providers are aware of the difficulties people from different language and cultural backgrounds can face in accessing Government services and getting results from them.
The Charter places the emphasis on building these cultural diversity considerations into the strategic planning, policy development, budgeting and reporting processes of government service delivery - irrespective of whether these services are provided by government agencies, community organisations or commercial enterprises.
(The access and equity strategy has never been applied to government business enterprises such as Telstra and Australia Post, and it is not proposed to do so now. The strong customer service orientation of these bodies should ensure they service the needs of their diverse clientele.)
The Charter summarises seven principles central to the design, delivery, monitoring, evaluation and reporting of quality government services in a culturally diverse society: these are access, equity, communication, responsiveness, effectiveness, efficiency, and accountability.
A set of practical implementation and monitoring strategies is appended to the Charter to provide best practice guidance to government service providers on implementation and reporting.
Some of the strategies may be considered pertinent to more than one principle.
For instance, cultural diversity training for staff can facilitate not only the development of non-discriminatory services (access) but also improvements in the way clients are treated (equity) and the sensitivity of services to the needs of diverse clients (responsiveness).
The formulation of these seven principles, and the related guidelines, has taken into account Commonwealth, State, Territory and Local Government statements on service delivery in a culturally diverse society.
Consequently, the principles and associated strategies constitute a genuinely Federal framework for delivering culturally responsive government services that can be consistently applied across all levels of government.
This framework is intended to commit all Government service providers to integrating the Charter's seven principles into their strategic planning, policy and corporate reporting processes so that the services they provide enable Australians of all backgrounds to have the opportunity to achieve their potential and participate fully in our society.
The Principles
1. Access
Government services should be available to everyone who is entitled to them and should be free of any form of discrimination irrespective of a person's country of birth, language, culture, race or religion.
2. Equity
Government services should be developed and delivered on the basis of fair treatment of clients who are eligible to receive them.
3. Communication
Government service providers should use strategies to inform eligible clients of services and their entitlements and how they can obtain them. Providers should also consult with their clients regularly about the adequacy, design and standard of government services.
4. Responsiveness
Government services should be sensitive to the needs and requirements of clients from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds, and responsive as far as practicable to the particular circumstances of individuals.
5. Effectiveness
Government service providers should be 'results oriented', focussed on meeting the needs of clients from all backgrounds.
6. Efficiency
Government service providers should optimise the use of available public resources through a user-responsive approach to service delivery which meets the needs of clients.
7. Accountability
Government service providers should have a reporting mechanism in place which ensures they are accountable for implementing Charter objectives for clients (for example, by reporting on this in annual reports or other types of report).
Best Practice Strategies for Achieving and Reporting on Government Services in a Culturally Diverse Society
The following implementation and reporting strategies are not intended to be prescriptive.
The implementation strategies identify a range of possible best practice activities which can help government service providers to incorporate and utilise cultural diversity in their policy and service delivery activities.
Similarly, the monitoring and reporting approaches identify possible means that can help providers determine whether their practical strategies are proving to be effective.
The precise nature of implementation strategies, performance indicators and reporting mechanisms will ultimately be a matter for government departments and agencies to determine.
1. Practical strategies for achieving access:
- Commitment to quality client services: Agencies recognise the special needs of clients from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds, for example for English or other language assistance through the use of interpreters, in order to make services accessible and appropriate. Understanding customer needs assures quality in service.
- Agencies need to be aware of possible double disadvantage that may be faced by indigenous or ethnic women, youth, older persons and disabled people when seeking to access government services.
- Agencies need to recognise the needs of clients in remote areas through developing outreach and community liaison arrangements. (This is also relevant to the incorporation of equity and communication considerations in service delivery arrangements.)
- Training: Public sector training programs in policy development, service delivery, and program management incorporate cultural diversity issues.
- Prevention of discrimination: Staff receive ongoing cultural diversity training so that they develop knowledge and skills to work effectively from a cultural framework.
Achievement of equal access to government services could be monitored by:
- Ensuring the regular collection, maintenance, analysis and use of data on potentially disadvantaged groups on the basis of their cultural and linguistic background, and using other data sources as appropriate.
- Where appropriate, reporting on proportional take up rates of clients categorised by their country of birth or cultural or linguistic background compared with their percentage composition of the total population in the service target group or catchment area.
While it is recognised that not everything can be quantified, some measurable indicators of access (such as proportional take up rates) can be useful in helping agencies to determine whether a strategy has succeeded or not - or to what degree it has succeeded.
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