1) Greater transparency. This will only come about when the public and the media refuse to let responsibility be palmed off.

For starters, reporters need to end the practice of quoting anonymous department spokespeople.
Government departments need to make the person in charge able to comment and need to have their name tacked to whatever they say, so the buck stops with them.

These department heads in turn, need to be able to honestly say what is wrong without all this rhetoric designed to cover their backside.

2) Another key element of this is legal reform. Issues such as this are often caused by a fear of litigation, which in turn is largely because lawyers have been keen to ensure they can get their clients a payout, which in turn ensures the profitability of their profession.
Regrettably, this clogs up the system and makes the cost of liability insurance skyrocket.
An inquisitorial system as used in Japan and Germany, which has a lower rate of wrongful imprisonment as well as fewer acquittals, is clearly a superior model, but you'll find there are few in the legal profession who are keen to adopt a system that will directly reduce their power and influence. In order to make this persuasive, they're apt to use noble rhetoric about the honour and tradition of our westminster model, but regrettably, it isn't backed up by the numbers.

If enough people start pushing for these two issues, the flow on effects would improve Australian society immeasurably.

PT you have the right to your views as strange as they are, however to link the problem to leadership is silly.
The thread holds promise ,had I known it was to be posted I would not have sent in can we trust DOCS in truth both threads highlight the real problem.
The public service is lost and leaderless within that group not just government.
I challenge strongly anything that drives us to be more American , and that one day we may be forced to dump the best Prime Minister we ever had because some silly time line has been crossed.

here's the first step if you want to do your bit for society.

http://www.parliament.qld.gov.au/EPetitions_QLD/HTML/RequestForm.pdf