Corruption was good for China’s economy. Can integrity be more beneficial?

10 April 2014

Trials began in Beijing yesterday of two members of the New Citizens Movement charged with “summoning a mob to disturb public order”. They follow a long list of Movement members being prosecuted and imprisoned for campaigning for the disclosure of assets by senior officials. Media and the public were prevented from entering the court.

Ironically although President Xi Jinping has been vocal about tackling corruption, there is no acceptance of civil rights groups doing likewise. Anti corruption initiatives are a Party monopoly; there is no tolerance for any form of organised opposition. The politically controlled measures seem to be having a substantial economic effect on their own.

A Bank of America assessment is that the official anti corruption campaign has taken $100 bn out of the Chinese economy this year.  The effects are seen in a slow down of restaurant business and a slump in sales of luxury goods. There has been a marked decline also in the sex trade in many cities.

Another problematic consequence has been a rapid increase in government bank deposits, up almost 30% year on year. The report indicates that “even honest officials, are now so terrified of starting new projects, for fear of being seen as corrupt, that they’re simply keeping public funds in the bank”.

The result may be that economic activity will reduce by up to 1.5% this year.

The anti corruption policy was intended to lower public consciousness of graft because widespread anger at the excesses of senior Communist Party members could threaten Party rule. But attacking corruption is having an unintended but substantial effect on slowing China’s economy.   Corruption has proved itself as a lubricant for growth. Can integrity prove to be of greater and more beneficial effect?

 

www.bbc.com/news/blogs-china-blog-26864134

 

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April 10, 2014

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Stealing a March on Australia – transparency at last on commitment to the Open Government Partnership

9 April 2014

State Services Commission has published the timelines for developing the action plan required of New Zealand as one of the prospects in the fourth, and most recent, cohort committing to the Open Government Partnership.

Member states are required to implement challenging action plans that will give effect to the OGP’s transparency and accountability objectives. The fourth cohort countries will formally join the OGP later this month once they have demonstrated their willingness to promote open government through the specifics of their action plans.

New Zealand will obviously not have a finalised action plan within the expected timeframe. By comparison, Ireland which is in the cohort with New Zealand, has been working with civil society for at least nine months, refining its proposals. The obverse is the case with Australia, also in the cohort, but whose intentions are even less clear. Perhaps as the invitations to join the OGP – to New Zealand by the British Prime Minister, and to Australia by President Obama – didn’t afford sufficient time, latitude has been permitted in complying with the OGP governance requirements. (Those requirements, republished last week after a review, include the specification that aspirant members have “concrete” action plans.)

New Zealand and Australia may have something to present to the Asia Pacific Regional Meeting taking place at Bali in early May. However the first meeting with civil society – Transparency New Zealand has taken the lead in seeking to contribute – is not until next week. The SSC timeline also indicates that it will be 31 July before the action plan is published. Mongolia, another fourth cohort country in the region, does not appear to be any more compliant. The Mongolia page on the OGP website is as devoid of content as those of New Zealand and Australia.

The SSC announcement will raise the ire of the privacy blogger at “Open and Shut”, who is continually critical of the lack of action regarding the OGP across the Tasman. New Zealand may have stolen a march on Australia.

 

www.ssc.govt.nz/open-government-partnership

http://foi-privacy.blogspot.co.nz/2014/03/the-great-open-government-partnership.html#.U0PVRkYU-00

http://www.opengovpartnership.org/blog

https://integritytalkingpoints.com/?s=OGP

 

 

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April 9, 2014

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A flattery of statistics

8 April 2014

International surveys often provide reassurance in the face of naysayers who criticise the New Zealand way of doing things.  Many posts on this blog relate to surveys conducted by international NGO s  which with few exceptions rate New Zealand well on indicators connected with social equity, integrity and good government. But the jingoism of yesterday’s Kiwiblog trumped all of that. It has a compilation of surveys which rate New Zealand well.   Of course there are many other surveys that do not include New Zealand in their measurements. The question then is whether New Zealand should be assessed as a mirror of Australia or of the leading Scandinavian countries, among which it usually compares well?. The Kiwiblog post lists the following schedule of surveys, which compare New Zealand with the World’s other 200 or so countries.  The surveys covered have more relevance to New Zealand than those that form part of the Global Observatory’s catalogue of indices. Many also contribute data to the Worldwide Governance Indicator reports.  However the list does not include some other interesting evaluations like the Sustainable Development survey reports in which New Zealand also rates well.

New Zealand rates well on the following indices, as listed on Kiwiblog.

  • Rule of Law                                        6th
  • Economic Freedom                       5th
  • Best to do business in                  2nd
  • Least Corrupt                                 1st
  • Open Data                                         4th
  • Prosperous                                      5th
  • Best to be a woman                      7th
  • Competitiveness                            18th
  • Peaceful                                              3rd
  • Democratic                                       5th
  • Human Development                   6th
  • Best for working women              1st
  • Freedom                                            1st
  • Open Budget                                   2nd
  • Best to be a mother                       4th
  • Humanitarian responses            3rd
  • Smallest gender gap                     5th
  • Generous                                        1st
  • Least failed                                     7th
  • Trade competitiveness              4th
  • Social progress                              1st

 

www.kiwiblog.co.nz/tag/country_rankings

http://theglobalobservatory.org/indices/351-indices.html

http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/index.php

http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.aspx#home

https://integritytalkingpoints.com/2011/05/09/should-new-zealand-blow-its-own-trumpet/?menu=1635

 

 

 

 

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April 7, 2014

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Is rorting allowances the culture at Westminster?

 

7 April 2014

The British Culture Secretary and Minister for Women and Equality appears to have lost the confidence of her colleagues. Trouble has been brewing over the last 15 months following a media report that she claimed the parliamentary mortgage relief allowance on a London property where her parents lived. She claimed it was her secondary residence which entitled her to an allowance, and that a rented house in her constitutency was her main home.

Matters appear to have been compounded by unhelpful responses to the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner who investigated the expense claim. Mrs Miller threatened to make a formal complaint about the commissioner, refused to provide documents to justify her claims and employed a lawyer to try to limit the scope of the investigation against her.

The Commons Standards Committee, made up of 10 MPs and three lay members, agreed with the commissioner that the London home should have been designated as her main home, but that it was reasonable under old guidance to regard it as her second home. Although the commissioner recommended a repayment of £45,000, the committee felt Mrs Miller should only pay back £5,800 as a “minor over-claim” on the £90,000 mortgage allowance she received – even so Mrs Miller “…tried to persuade them that she should only pay £4,000.”

A former chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life described this uncooperative response as pretty shocking; “the degree of lack of cooperation or the attempt to divert the commissioner from addressing the issues concerned seems fairly exceptional. I think particularly for a senior Cabinet minister, who you expect to show a leadership role in cooperating with whatever expenses system is around, it is pretty shocking… I think the public will be very shocked that the committee did overturn one of the key recommendations about how much should be repaid, when there is a real possibility that the minister made a capital gain with the help of public funds.”

Mrs Miller made an unreserved apology to the Commons last week.

A Cabinet colleague indicated that the Minister should quit but said her career had been saved by the committee’s decision to largely ignore the commissioner’s findings. “What Maria Miller has done is serious but she has been cleared by the body set up to investigate her…The fault is with the system.”

He commented that “.…she has clearly behaved in a way that is incompatible with what she should be doing as a Cabinet minister. The decision to keep her on undermines the Prime Minister because he has talked about a new kind of politics.”  The Telegraph reports that none of the 50 Conservative Party backbench MPs asked about this matter were willing to support her.

The acceptance by the committee that the mortgage relief claim was only a minor overcharge, seems to rationalise opportunism. There was no entitlement to the allowance. This seems different in kind from the claims by some New Zealand MPs that were brought to public attention by the media in December 2013. That related to the omission from MP disclosure requirements of arrangements by which MPs establish superannuation schemes that own the Wellington house where they stay when on Parliamentary business and for which they receive an accommodation allowance.

 

www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/apr/05/maria-miller-expenses-culture-secretary-mps

www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/227409/mps-‘complying’-with-disclosure-rules-on-property

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/apr/07/maria-miller-national-newspapers

 

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April 7, 2014

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New Zealand again rates well on Rule of Law index – but who cares?

2 April 2014

New Zealand now ranks 6th on the Rule of Law Index published by the World Justice Project last month (comparing 99 countries). It was placed 4th on the 2011 Index (which compared 66 countries) – the 2012-13 Index did not include overall rankings.

Neither New Zealand media nor interest groups have shown much interest in this Index which measures adherence to the Rule of Law through 47 indicators organised around eight themes –

  • constraints on government powers
  • absence of corruption
  • open government
  • fundamental rights
  • order and security
  • regulatory enforcement
  • civil justice, and
  • criminal justice.

Transparency International (NZ) which champions the rule of law as an overarching component of the National Integrity System made no reference to the Index findings in its proposals for strengthening the NIS, released a fortnight after the Index was published. Transparency International (NZ) proposals were heavy on promoting open government, but the Index rated New Zealand as globally the second best for its open government focus, better than its third place ranking for the absence of corruption.

The Office of the Auditor General website makes no mention of the Rule of Law Index although the six Worldwide Governance Indicators, of which one is the rule of law, are measures for determining its statement of intent goal of trusted state services. (But then again the OAG site has not recognised the Worldwide Governance Indicators report published in September 2013 either.)

The Rule of Law Index places New Zealand in the top ten globally in six of the eight dimensions measured. ‘Criminal justice’ and ‘order and security’ are the more poorly rated dimensions. Compared with most, New Zealand has a healthy abundance of the foundational premises for the Rule of Law –

  • accountability under law
  • clear and publicised law, applied evenly, which protects rights
  • legislative and enforcement processes that are fair and accessible
  • accessible and timely justice.

 

Bill Gates is a substantial sponsor of the World Justice Project.

 

World Justice Project’s Rule of Law Index 2014

  1. Denmark
  2. Norway
  3. Sweden
  4. Finland
  5. Netherlands
  6. New Zealand
  7. Austria
  8. Australia
  9. Germany
  10. Singapore

 

http://worldjusticeproject.org/rule-of-law-index

http://www.oag.govt.nz/2013/statement-of-intent/part1.htm

https://integritytalkingpoints.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=650&action=edit

www.transparency.org.nz

 

 

 

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April 2, 2014

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English criminal lawyers and probation officers are fooling around today

1 April 2014

In what presumably is a marker of April Fool’s Day, probation officers and criminal lawyers in England and Wales have chosen the birthday of the sector Minister – the Justice Secretary – to  engage in street protests and industrial action against the UK Government’s policy to privatise 70% of the probation service and to cut about £215 million from the legal aid budget. Probation officers however will wait until midday before taking action!

The UK Government funds a “very generous” £2 bn annually for “one of the most expensive legal aid systems in the world”. But in dealing with its financial challenges seeks savings of approximately 10% in legal aid spending.

The combined demonstrations aim to incapacitate the courts for the day, drawing attention to the effects of budget reductions that allegedly dismantle the criminal justice system and the right to a fair defence, and the “dangerous social experiment” of privatising the supervision of offenders on release from prison.

That may well be the case if outsourced probation services were to reflect the model of several US jurisdictions described in a recent Guardian article (link below).

Today also marks the commencement of the Accident Compensation scheme 40 years ago and the 101st anniversary of the New Zealand Public Service.

 

http://union-news.co.uk/2014/03/probation-officers-announce-new-strike-date/

www.headoflegal.com/2014/03/09/gemma-burns-it-means-injustice-for-all/

www.bbc.com/news/uk-26454362

www.theguardian.com/money/2014/mar/02/poor-

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April 1, 2014

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If only updated Crown Entity guidance was available to Chinese official whose $14.5 bn assets are seized!

31 March 2014

“Do you lust after money, jewellery and paintings? Are you starved of affection at home and considering an extra-marital affair?

If the answers to those questions were, “Yes” you could be on the verge of becoming a corrupt Communist Party official, according to a new ethics test aimed at purifying the Chinese civil service”.

Ironically this report of a new tool for training China’s officials to resist temptation was publicised as a massive investigation in the corrupt activities of Zhou Yangkang comes to a head.

Zhou, formerly one of the nine members of the Standing Committee of the Politburo, had been a national security chief with charge of police, prosecutors, courts and intelligence agencies. That was until August 2013 when he became a target of the President’s campaign against corruption by the party elite.

Now confined at a military base in Inner Mongolia, assets worth at least $US 14.5 billion have been seized from Zhou, his family and associates. He was the head of China National Petroleum Corp, the country’s largest oil and gas company. That provided the opportunity to develop energy related interests including brokering sales of oil-field equipment to Iraq (causing huge losses for Chinese state-owned oil companies); constructing hydroelectric power stations in Sichuan (where his father was the provincial party boss from 1999 to 2002); providing information technology for 8,000 state-owned gas stations; and investing in real estate, oil exploration and toll roads.

The most damaging revelation so far concerns Zhou’s friendship with a billionaire mafia boss, Liu Han, now on trial for organised crime and murder. Liu made his fortune with Zhou’s help.

The reference in the ethics test to an extra marital affair has a connection with Zhou’s case, as in many high profile corruption proceedings. Mistresses have become the ultimate symbol of Chinese corruption. A 2007 Government inquiry reported that about 90% of senior officials embroiled in corruption scandals kept a mistress – and in the case of the former Railways Minister jailed for corruption in 2013 – 18 mistresses.

One of the charges brought against Zhou centres around his wife. She is a media personality 28 years his junior. He was having an affair with her at the time his then-wife died in a car crash allegedly arranged by Zhou.

The State Services Commission guidance to Crown Entities published on 28 March seems somewhat mundane by comparison.

The provisions relating to gifts and hospitality include the following:   “All Crown entity boards need to have in place a clear and well-understood internal policy on accepting and offering gifts, hospitality or other benefits, and how they will be recorded and disposed of. Key elements of any policy and practice require:

  • that board members must not solicit gifts and benefits from, or on behalf of, anyone under any circumstances;
  • board members not to accept gifts and benefits from anyone, or on behalf of anyone, who could benefit from influencing them or the entity;
  • open and transparent practices in relation to gifts that enhance trust in the State services, and reduce any misplaced speculation;
  • an agreed approach to the dollar value of gifts or hospitality that are appropriate for board members to accept, and the practice to be followed regarding the use of benefits in kind (eg, air points);
  • that, unless they are ‘consumable’ at the time (eg, meals, invitation to events), gifts should be regarded as the property of the entity;
  • the context to be taken into account when considering hospitality offered by stakeholders to balance the opportunities that may be provided against the potential for criticism. For instance, does the timing coincide with a particular board decision that could affect the donor: how relevant is the event or function to the entity’s role; will the board’s interests genuinely be advanced by having a board member present; should the entity itself meet the costs of attendance in order to avoid any perceptions of influence over the board?
  • close scrutiny of offers such as invitations to attend conferences in New Zealand or overseas that may comprise travel, accommodation, meals, a fee for speaking, and/or inclusion of a member’s partner. It is essential to consider whether there would be real value to the Crown entity from attendance, and – if so – who is best placed to represent the board or the entity; and
  • that all boards which are considering offering gifts or hospitality should think very carefully about both the cost and the public and political perception of doing so. Policies needs to specify the purposes for which, and occasions on which, it is acceptable to give gifts, and the nature and value of gifts that are appropriate to particular occasions.”

Perhaps Zhou will regret similar advice was not available to him!

 

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10631079/Chinas-Communist-officials-face-anti-corruption-exam.html

http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/03/30/china-corruption-zhou-idINL4N0MR03G20140330

http://ssc.govt.nz/node/9250

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March 31, 2014

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Is there a scot-free approach to political neutrality?

19 March 2014

The State Services Commissioner remarked that he saw his role as a guardian of political neutrality across the State services when, last month, he released the updated election-year guidance for agencies and their staff.

His guidance reiterates behavioural expectations promoted before each of the last five general elections. The underpinning message is that officials have political rights and are encouraged to have a lively interest in political matters.  However the requirement is that all State servants keep their jobs out of politics and politics out of their jobs.

“Politically-neutral State Services are a cornerstone of New Zealand’s democratic system – ensuring continuity of government functions regardless of which political parties make up the government.  This includes paying careful attention to managing conflicts or potential conflicts between their roles as State servants and their private interests, including political loyalties, and their interests as employees.

State servants must act with loyalty to the government of the day and to successive governments, and they must work to maintain public confidence in the institutions of government by continuing to demonstrate their commitment to Ministers’ priorities and policies.”

Standards about political neutrality comprise the impartiality principle, one of the foundations of the code of conduct – “We are fair, impartial, responsible and trustworthy”.

In Scotland there may be less certainty about impartiality expectations of officials. The UK Public Administration Select Committee has begun an inquiry into the political neutrality of the Civil Service, and compliance with the Civil Service code of conduct in relation to the independence referendum in Scotland.

The Scottish Government Permanent Secretary last year referred to the two-fold responsibilities of civil servants in Scotland:

  • “to deliver the policies of the elected Government of Scotland, which includes delivering the current Scottish Government’s Purpose of creating a more successful country by increasing sustainable economic growth with an opportunity for all of Scotland to flourish; and
  • to act with integrity, impartiality, objectivity and honesty”.

The Select Committee will explore how civil servants in Scotland are meeting those responsibilities in the run-up to the independence referendum, and the more general impact on the wider UK Civil Service.

www.ssc.govt.nz/2014-election-guidance-released

http://www.ssc.govt.nz/node/1912

www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/public-administration-select-committee/news/civil-service-impartiality-and-referendums/

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March 20, 2014

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Little focus on open government during Sunshine Week

18 March 2014

This is “Sunshine Week” in the United States, adopted by media and public interest  groups as a marker of open government.  The week began with the celebration of Freedom of Information Day on 16  March, the anniversary of the birth of James Madison (Fourth US President), considered the Founding Father of Freedom of Information.

This enthusiasm for the ideal is rather more challenged in reality.  The annual World Press Freedom Index published last month indicates that press freedom in  the United States continues to deteriorate, slipping 13 places since the 2013 index to 46th of the 160 countries assessed.

Finland remains at the top of the Index where it has ranked since 2010, and the others in the top ten are Scandinavian and “Scandinavian-like” countries. New Zealand is in 9th place (slipping from 8th in 2013).  Australia is ranked 28th (down from 26th), and the United Kingdom is 33rd (down from 29th).  These movements may reflect the changed methodology used for the 2014 Index, although Denmark was the only other country  in the top ten rankings  that slipped a place.

The Press Freedom Index, compiled by Reporters without Borders, assesses the degree to which journalists and the media have freedom to report, and the commitment of national authorities to ensure respect for that freedom.

All New Zealand departments are being surveyed this week on their adoption of the 2011 Declaration on Open and Transparent Government. Responses are “expected to provide useful data on whether the release of high-value public data for re-use has become a business-as-usual practice, what mechanisms departments are using to find out what data their users identify as high value, and what impact that release has had.”  The findings will be reported to Cabinet later in the year.

2014 World Press Freedom Index

1 Finland
2 Netherlands
3 Norway
4 Luxembourg
5 Andorra
6 Liechtenstein
7 Denmark
8 Iceland
9 New Zealand
10 Sweden

http://rsf.org/index2014/en-index2014.php

http://ict.govt.nz/programmes/open-and-transparent-government/declaration-open-and-transparent-government/

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March 19, 2014

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Keeping trust when those about you may be losing theirs

23 February 2014

The 2014 Edelman Trust Barometer published this month suggests that in many places the commitment to integrity and trustworthiness is slipping . The survey findings are that trust in government has fallen to its lowest level in the 14 years of the survey – and in the United States trust in government is 21 points lower than trust in business. In the United States trust measures dropped 10 points – the drop was 13 points in Poland and 9 points in Mexico.

However in some of the 27 surveyed countries the situation was reversed.   The trend was of an improvement in trust in UAR, Indonesia, Australia, and the Argentine. The survey of 27,000 respondents in 27 countries did not cover the views of New Zealanders.

Good government depends on a commitment to the rule of law, a respect for the democratic process and public trust; trust that government will serve its citizens and a belief that officials are trustworthy and that they operate trustworthy systems.   

Trustworthiness flows from integrity rich conduct. Accountability, transparency and integrity are characteristics of trustworthiness.  Integrity embodies all ethical values.  It is much more than honesty.  It is what makes for wholeness.  In New Zealand, integrity in government is reflected in the spirit of service. Chief executives of Public Service departments have a statutory duty to imbue their employees with the spirit of service to the community – “government for the people”, as Lincoln observed at Gettysburg, and Aristotle wrote about the polis several millennia earlier.  They are also responsible for the integrity and conduct of their employees.

New Zealand agencies and their staff must comply with the integrity standards applied to them by the State Services Commissioner.  The greater the commitment to the Commissioner’s 18 standards – which are grouped by obligation into being  “fair”, “impartial”, “responsible” and ”trustworthy” –  the less likely incidents will occur which impact on perceptions of trustworthiness.

Trust belongs with citizens – not with leaders. It is not something to be managed through PR. It requires constant work – hence the cliché about being hard earned and easily spent.

An address to the OECD last month on Talking Trust – The Fall of Public Relations and the Rise of Public Leadership  emphasised how building trust necessitates community involvement. It is driven by citizens not leaders. “The future lies in what we do, not what we say. We should focus on actions, not words. Trust is not a message. It is an outcome. It is deeply behavioural.”

“Trusted leadership demands not only truth, but ethics and values; leadership with vision; transparency and accountability; democracy and empowerment; transformation and a transition plan to achieve it; and, above all, deeds, not words.”

www.jerichochambers.com/lecture-trust-and-the-fall-of-public-relations/

www.ssc.govt.nz/code

www.edelman.com/p/6-a-m/2014-edelman-trust-barometer/

www.edelman.com/insights/intellectual-property/2014-edelman-trust-barometer/trust-around-the-world/

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February 23, 2014

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