JayB
What you have said is just utter rot - I am not sure if you are just being funny. Having been in that position, there is no room in a ministerial office for slackers, never has been, they don't last. The pressures don't just stop between parliamentary sitting periods, there is the electorate responsibilities, meetings (with organisations, community groups, constituents and other politicians), speeches, interaction with media and Cabinet duties.

The perks are only an allowance in lieu of overtime, on top of a basic bureacratic pay packet it pales in comparison to those with similar pressures in the business sector.

The pay is not the issue, the issue is lack of staff and issues of turnover as in this thread.

In my experience staffers usually last a long time given they are usually committed to their jobs. There may be some interchange of staff between ministerial offices at times but never have I seen a 60% turnover.

There is obviously something else going on but given the reluctance of staffers and public servants to speak out we won't know probably the whole truth until a tell-all book comes out years after the events.

My years of advising senior management, in particular CEO’s have left me with key ideas that we can use to compare leaders in terms of their management style.
;Leaders, when their work has been done properly, know that they have succeeded when the workers say, we did this ourselves. (Chinese Proverb).
;Data is important, not speculation.
;Improvement is important, not looking for someone to blame or someone to punish.
;Learning is important, to understand what is necessary for success.
; Long term thinking beats short term thinking every time.

;Looking for someone to blame or hold accountable belongs to the 1840’s train crash investigations. Blaming prevents the examination of complex management system failures.
;In hierarchies’ information goes up through filters and directions go down through megaphones.
;In a world without data, opinion prevails. Where opinion prevails, whoever has power is king.
;It is dangerous to rely on data that are contaminated by fear.
;In fear-based management cultures, people tend to focus on eliminating the threat to them instead of working to achieve desired leadership outcomes.
;The boss is often the last to know what is happening down the line.
For example, at the senate committee on insulation, the public servants said they did not provide information to Minister Garrett because he did not ask for it. Were they afraid because of shoot the messenger stories? Or is this part of their culture?
;Most importantly the management needs to stand back and work ‘on the system’ and not ‘in the system’. Therefore systems with many feed back loops need to be established so all involve know what is going on.
; Cooperation beats competition every time. In fact competition promotes individual interest over the interests of the organisation.
;Great leaders are drawn to, and care about people. They encourage cooperation, they look outwards. Poor leaders perceive people as expendable commodities and unions as a threat. They pit employees against each other, they look inwards.
;The command and control model is not appropriate and barely ever worked even in the Prussian Military.

Shadow Minister,

As far as I'm aware, being covered by Workers' Comp while travelling to-and-from work was one of the things removed under Workchoices and I don't think it's been restored. Some Unions are offering to provide individual coverage via Insurance Companies.

I also empathise with working long hours and the toll it takes over a period. A result of Howard's policies had me driving for 7 hours per day plus working for eight. Take away two hours pay to cover fuel and I was working 15 hours and earning six.

For me the thread is evidence of the lost nature of Tony Abbott and those who support him.
Jayb was it ?went for the extremely uninformed forgetting that only the letter T separates a Wit From a Twit.
Post WWII we woke from our slumber, migrants working two jobs showed us how to achieve home ownership and much more.
Often we put life style on hold till after we have established home ownership and other rewards hard work offers, who can hold such acts in contempt?
And in every walk of life people want to succeed, to be the best, surely the extreme hours our PM works are a reason for supporting him?
Or do we drop into the childlike mold of the jayb,s and taunt hard efforts.
I have worked shoulder to shoulder with one of Rudd's Queensland days staff, yes he is demanding, wants the best, but no chains hold people to the job.
Many having won their spurs move on to another challenge .
Would we want anything but the best efforts from him and them?
Is ranting RABBOTT saying he will not let his staff give their best, that he will be out peddling his pushy instead of in his office?
RABBOTT like that remember you heard it here.

I'm with Shadow Minister on this one.

Rudd's staff work dogyears because he's a dog.

The track record of long hours is there to be seen by everyone.

If 'long hours' produced good and considered policies there would be no 'insulation scam', no 'green loans scam', no BER builders scam', no 'reworking of Howard's immingration scam' would there?

And we'd all be well aware of how pinching our GST money and rebadging it as 'Commonwealth' money was really funding health better because all those doghours would have been translated into a clear information campaign that had the electors pleading with state premiers to sign-on.

But... I have not noticed any such thing going on at all, for all those doghours.

Foxy, as always, is trying to gloss over matters and sound like the court appointed 'reasonable man'.

How about demanding airline pilots work these hours Foxy?

Or truckies? I used to work with a fellow carting wine and cement up from Adelaide to Brisbane, via Broken Hill... he did two trips a week, with 40 tons a time, over loaded and over driving.

One a week is safe, and legal.

Should this behaviour be tolerated, 'in the national interest'?

Anyway, the nonsense spoken about work-life issues is a complete whitewash.

Anyone seriously interested in the 'balance' would start by calling it 'life work'.

Until that happens, it should be seen as just another catch-phrase, just another empty fashion accessory for a 'responsible' employer to point to.

Perhaps a modest look into the building industry, where subbies work very long hours and maintain themselves on speed and other drugs, and get killed in the process...might be worthwhile?

As for the wages these dogeared advisors earn... look in the Oz job ads. They are very modest pays indeed, with an overtime allowance, not regular penalty rates.

The Blue Cross is that the only name you ever posted here under?
Rarely is it the name we post under that drive comment away, more often it is content such as yours in that post.
RABBOTT would be proud of you.
He is safe as leader of the opposition and will be next election and if he wants it the one after.