It's good to see that Federal Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd, sees greater transparency as one of the ways of improving government processes. Last week he said that a national, online, searchable database that would allow anyone to track development applications, would produce significant efficiency gains, and improve decision making with the potential to reduce housing costs by 15%.
While many local councils in NSW already provide such a tracking service, no one to date has identified the savings or improvements that have resulted. In any event greater openness in these processes is a step forward in accountability.
But Mr. Rudd, why stop there?
If you put your mind to it there are a whole range of potential improvements that would come from disclosure of information about the conduct of public functions, at all levels of government.
Let's hope the Federal ALP takes a broad and comprehensive look at the wide range of possible improvements that would come from greater transparency in government.
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