On her first full day as an independent, Jacquie Lambie joined three other crossbench senators in pointlessly thwarting the government's bill to formalise the abolition of the Australian National Preventive Health Agency (ANPHA) – an agency that was already dismantled earlier this year, with many of its responsibilities reassigned within the Department of Health.
ANPHA has already ceased to exist, and stopping the repeal bill is not going to resurrect it. Even as a symbolic gesture, this is a poor move on Lambie's part, because if ever an agency were ripe for cutting, it's ANPHA.
During its three years, the agency focused primarily on obesity, alcohol, and tobacco – a narrow segment of the broader category of preventive health. Its initiatives included a healthy eating cookbook featuring recipes for such basic dishes as spaghetti bolognese; a project that received nearly $190,000 in funding.
As an attempt to address obesity-related diseases, ANPHA was not cost-effective, it was wasteful.
The CEO of ANPHA is still being paid an annual salary of over $300,000 even though the agency has been closed down. Louise Sylvan, whose contract runs until 2016, declined to take a redundancy package earlier this year, and without legislation her contract – and salary – remain in effect.
From Louise Sylvan's perspective, declining the redundancy was the smart thing to do. But from the taxpayer's perspective, it's just money down the drain.
Preventing the repeal bill from going through does nothing to protect ANPHA. All it protects is bureaucratic jobs that have been literally 'do-nothing' for several months already.
Helen Andrews is a Policy Analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies. Her report An Ounce of Prevention? A Toolkit for Evaluating Preventive Health Measures was released on 26 November 2014.
Home > Commentary > Opinion > Lambie off to bad start with meaningless ANPHA stand
Lambie off to bad start with meaningless ANPHA stand
ANPHA has already ceased to exist, and stopping the repeal bill is not going to resurrect it. Even as a symbolic gesture, this is a poor move on Lambie's part, because if ever an agency were ripe for cutting, it's ANPHA.
During its three years, the agency focused primarily on obesity, alcohol, and tobacco – a narrow segment of the broader category of preventive health. Its initiatives included a healthy eating cookbook featuring recipes for such basic dishes as spaghetti bolognese; a project that received nearly $190,000 in funding.
As an attempt to address obesity-related diseases, ANPHA was not cost-effective, it was wasteful.
The CEO of ANPHA is still being paid an annual salary of over $300,000 even though the agency has been closed down. Louise Sylvan, whose contract runs until 2016, declined to take a redundancy package earlier this year, and without legislation her contract – and salary – remain in effect.
From Louise Sylvan's perspective, declining the redundancy was the smart thing to do. But from the taxpayer's perspective, it's just money down the drain.
Preventing the repeal bill from going through does nothing to protect ANPHA. All it protects is bureaucratic jobs that have been literally 'do-nothing' for several months already.
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