Hopes and disappointments: assessing institutional change in the federal parliament since the Jenkins Review

In November 2021 the Human Rights Commission presented its report called the Independent Review into Commonwealth Parliamentary Workplaces (known as the Jenkins Review). The Review was a response to reports of misconduct towards staff, which brought a new focus on the role of parliamentarians as employers and the status of staff as employees, present within a public sector workplace rather than in private spaces, personal to a parliamentarians.

This challenged the sense of entitlement held by many parliamentarians, their seeming untrammelled power within the employment relationship and the fact their offices appeared to be unregulated, with many lacking professional employment practices. In the almost 4 years since the Jenkins Review was released, parliament has worked to implement its 28 recommendations. Progress on implementation has been slow and difficult.

This paper reviews the major reforms undertaken, some of which are ground-breaking, aimed at changing the culture and institutions of parliament. However other elements of the implementation are disappointing and represent a reinforcement of existing patterns of power in the parliamentary workplace and an unwillingness to tackle fundamental problems.

Dr Maria Maley is Senior Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations at the Australian National University. She has published widely on political advisers and ministerial staff, gender and political leadership, public administration and public policy.
She worked as a consultant to the 2021 Jenkins Review. She was awarded the Marian Simms Policy Engagement Award by the Australian Political Studies Association in 2022 and the School of Politics and International Relations Award for Impact and Outreach in 2024. Her book (written with Marian Sawer) Toxic parliaments and what can be done about them was published in 2024.