Who's running the country?

Can the government cope with the bureaucracy?

This new government is barely two weeks old but already there are warning signs it’s not going to get anywhere fast dealing with the Public Service bureaucracy.

Two interactions between ministers and senior officials raise concerns.

Police Minister Mark Mitchell sends a letter of  expectation to Police Commissioner Andrew Coster saying he expects the police to focus on core policing in communities, and that he requires strong and decisive leadership to overcome significant challenges to law and order.

But Mitchell then says he has full confidence in Coster, despite unbridled criticism of him from opposition. So Coster is staying, although the letter does put him on notice.

Even worse is what’s happening at the Ministry of Education. As yet another set of PISA results comes out showing that the academic achievement of the country’s children continues to slide, the tough talking Minister Erica Stanford makes an appointment which gives us absolutely no confidence in the ability or willingness of the Ministry to change its ways.

Stanford has made Ellen McGregor-Reid, the current Deputy Secretary for Early Learning and Student Achievement, the main education advisor in her office.

In other words, McGregor-Reid, a career public servant with no actual frontline experience in education, will be the main liaison between the Minister who promises to turn around our failing education system and a Ministry which has been a dismal failure under its current leadership.

What’s more McGregor-Reid’s role overseeing early learning and student achievement saw a decrease in both learning standards and student achievement.

It makes you wonder - what is Erica Stanford thinking?

As outspoken education consultant Alwyn Poole says this is like making Sauron the Mayor of Hobbiton. Or as we used to say, putting the fox in charge of the henhouse.

The PISA results out this week show the dire state of educational achievement. This year’s outcomes were the worst ever and what’s more they were skewed upwards because of the low participation rate. That standards across all countries dropped is just no excuse.

What we should also note are the number of parents who know what’s going on and are making huge sacrifices to put their kids into private schools because they know the state system is in many instances bordering on useless.

At my 7 year old granddaughter’s state primary school, the teachers finally get around to trying to do some maths with the kids at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. Not a time when enthusiasm for learning is high. She’s going elsewhere next year.

Erica Stanford has talked a big game. But this early appointment is not inspiring confidence.