Agree Indy, the man with the highest IQ in Oz was reportedly running behind a garbage truck with garbage cans. Some of the over-privileged thought he might have chosen that "honorable work"? Me? I believe he came from the wrong side of the underprivileged ranks and took what honest work he was qualified for. As many of us also had to.

Even I who I'm told had the third highest IQ? And graduated from army medical school with honours even though I hadn't completed a single year of high school. To put that in context, there were a number of recently graduated med students in that room who knew the stools were odourless. And were as suprised as! When their scores were a lot lower.

I'm still treated with rare contempt and intellectual arrogance due to my age not my intellectual ability. Grey hair seems to mean you have nothing left to contribute, even if ones best and most valuable ideas are still to be realized.

It'd be a crime if they're buried with me.

If I had a PHD there'd be no problem getting others to listen and if that PHD was the result of parental deep pockets? I doubt very much if my ideas would be worth very much as a commercial proposition, as I'd probably be a second rate doctor or lawyer charging ridiculous, gold plated fees. Or a me, me, me, hasbeen?

Or get elected as a smooth talking pollie that takes home a very nice taxpayer funded salary, entitlements and a pension others can only dream of?
Alan B.

Alan B,
How could we possibly overturn the insidious Peter Principal culture in the Public service ?
If inroads could be made there, the battle would be 75% won !
There has to be a way of making people in responsible positions accountable ! I always thought a kind of national service, in fact, anything would be better than Status quo.

Agree Indy. I believe we need to isolate and identify incompetence usually accompanied by blame shifting and accepting the praise and kudos for the work of others.

I believe we need a clinical test that identifies the corporate cowboy in the ranks of the public service. And limit the number of assistants that make these look halfway competent.

Other than that, need a complete cleanout of public service positions with every change of government! Which as I see it, is the only real way of making unelected decision makers accountable for their decisions!

Also elected officials ought to be able to appoint their own public servants and then also wear it when they F up! And F-ing up should come with the sack as it would be for all others in the workforce!
Alan B.

Academics do no such thing. A change in funding won't change the nature of academia but i agree that we should go back to the 1970s and free education

Introduce natural attrition followed by probation for successors in the public Service & within a very short time improvements will become noticeable in humanity rather than the inhumanity we're dealing with now.
A successor to a bureaucrat position should not automatically receive the salary of their predecessor, they need to first prove they're capable before any pay rise.
There simply is no other way to get accountability under way !