Home Affairs has opened voluntary redundancies to public
servants and managers across its 16,000 strong workforce, as a staffing squeeze
takes hold of the federal public service.
Staff in the APS and Executive Level ranks will be eligible
to apply, as will the Australian Border Force members.
Redundancies will not be offered to the department's 187
senior executives.
A spokesperson for Home Affairs would not say why the
department was looking to cut costs, but it fits a broader trend across the
service in the lead-up to Labor's fifth budget.
"The decision to implement a [voluntary redundancy]
program is not connected to any one issue but rather is one component of the
department's broader workforce and budget management," they said.
The departments of Climate Change, Social Services, Prime
Minister and Cabinet and Education are all offering redundancies, as are the
National Indigenous Australians Agency, Fair Work Ombudsman and the Australian
Bureau of Statistics.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has
meanwhile frozen recruitment in the lead-up to the budget.
Labor defeated a Coalition campaign against a significant
increase to the federal public service in the 2025 election by successfully
drawing links between Peter Dutton and US President Donald Trump.
Instead, the Albanese government has defended its addition
of about 41,000 public servants since it came to power by promising to restore
integrity to government and find billions in savings by slashing contractors,
consultants and labour hire.
Labor is not expected to cut public service numbers
significantly in the next budget but agency heads are preparing for tough
decisions in the next budget, as they face pressure to find additional savings
while paying out a 3.4 per cent wage to staff in 2026.
Sam McCrone, a representative from the Community and Public
Sector Union, said the push for savings was exacerbating significant workload
pressures.
"This government needs to step in and direct agencies to be
looking for other ways to save money and stop the over-reliance on wasteful and
expensive outsourcing of public sector work.
"And we need to see next month's federal budget
prioritise and invest in public services and public sector jobs."
Former Finance deputy secretary Stephen Bartos said the
redundancies were fairly widespread, but that some agencies were focusing more
on cutting external labour.
"A number of departments have, I have heard, cut back
quite considerably on contractors," he said.
"Contractors aren't having their contracts renewed for
next year, which is not the same as redundancies, but has a similar effect [of
reducing their expenses budget]."
First published: in the Canberra Times on April 29, 2026 as "Voluntary redundancies hit national security agency", By Miriam Webber,
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