It may be comforting to maintain a smug sense of NZ being morally superior. However, it must be asked whether NZ's clean reputation is grounded in reality or whether it is simply that corruption in NZ is not identified because NZ doesn't bother to look for it.

Journalism like this is rarely seen in NZ these days.

It is worth noting that in Australia (which is generally perceived to be more corrupt than NZ) major scandals are often revealed by serious current affairs programmes, such as the ABC's 4 Corners and 7.30, and well-resourced and long-term investigations carried out by newspapers (e.g. The Age & SMH)

NZ funds public broadcasting at one of the lowest rates per capita of all developed countries. Meanwhile, the commercial media sector lurches from crisis to crisis and is imcreasingly unwilling to invest in probing, long-form journalism.

Besides such problems as the lack of a central anti-corruption body, a small and chummy govt/business elite, and political influence-buying, the under-resourcing of investigative journalism relative to comparable countries enables those with power to escape accountability.

The wholesale gutting of the curriculum shows enormous disrespect to all those who engaged in the development process in good faith.

*shifts

While the missing 'f' in the original was not intentional, I must admit that 'rapid policy s***s' does sum up the quality of some NZ policy-making over the years.

Besides the human costs of this, the economic damage caused by so many people having no choice but to either give up their careers and start from scratch or to leave the country must be massive.

funding or employment, and there is no option to move to another region within the country where the policy settings are more favourable.

If ministers don't like or value your sector, especially if it is one that is in the public sector or relies on public funding, you not only face a serious risk of redundancy, but also of then facing a flooded job market, as often the whole sector is hit, there are no other significant sources of...

constitutional checks limit the ability of government to make rapid policy shits, here workers are far more directly affected by the whims of the national executive.

- NZ's highly centralised system of government (and, with it, decision-making and funding). Where elsewhere state or regional governments might pull in different policy directions to national government (e.g. while one level is cutting services, the other is increasing service provision) or ...

NZ is not alone in having a problem with overly frequent and ill-considered restructuring, but the problem seems particularly bad here and this is compounded by:
- NZ's small size, which naturally limits alternative career opportunities for those affected by restructures and redundancies, and

It's troubling that those leading the service show so little regard for upholding its standards and reputation.

It has certainly been a massive and disturbing change.

Any entry-level public servant would know that the actions being taken in recent days by PSC leadership are completely beyond the pale, breaching the most basic norms expected of all public servants.