IPAA Victoria 2020 Leadership in the Public Sector Awards ceremony

Between April to July 2020, the Commission consulted with 644 children and young people in diverse contexts, and 172 workers from 70 organisations providing a range of services and supports. The Commission mobilised multiple communication methods to reach diverse respondents.

The findings detailed the pandemic’s massive impact on the lives of children and young people in Victoria, across safety, mental health and education, revealing a picture of growing uncertainty and isolation, combined with diminished visibility. The  Commission communicated findings to government Ministers,  departments, key stakeholders and the public to highlight the experiences of children and young people and advocate for responses to protect their wellbeing.  The Commission’s work influenced changes in the government’s pandemic response and constructively challenged the prevailing media dialogue on the experiences of children and young people.

As part of the 2020 Local Government Elections the Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) delivered a state-wide communication and engagement program to maximise public awareness and participation amongst all eligible voters. Program activities and consistent messaging were delivered across two phases – enrolment and voting – and through multiple traditional and emerging mediums, including print, radio, digital and social media, mass messaging and offline/outdoor advertising.

The program involved both general communications directed at all eligible voters, alongside targeted communications directed mainly towards under-represented groups, such as voters from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, young people, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and people experiencing homelessness. Audiences were segmented to ensure the appropriate messages were tailored and delivered through the right medium to specific target groups.

Local council elections generally have lower voter turnout and lower levels of public interest compared with state elections. Evidence on the issues that resonated most strongly with voters and the most common sources of election information was used to implement a responsive, targeted and cost-effective communications program. Stakeholders, including major media outlets and local councils were engaged throughout the campaign. These factors, alongside a sustained media presence, contributed to the highest participation rate at local council elections ever recorded.

Early in Victoria’s response to the pandemic, announcements on restrictions were primarily reactive, in response to emerging outbreaks or rising case numbers. There was no definitive timeframe or ability to assure the public of the duration or threshold for easing. The public required more transparency and assurance in government decision making. The second wave was complex with significant media and public scrutiny. A more aggressive, yet proportionate bundle of restrictions was required to flatten the curve. The degree of imposition on Victorians’ lives was foreshadowed as significant but necessary based on available evidence at that time. The COVID-19 Strategy and Policy team designed the ‘Roadmap to Reopening’ as an enduring high-level framework for restrictions to demonstrate how we would emerge from the second wave. The roadmap needed to be acceptable to stakeholders, while balancing public health risks. This required collaboration, thoughtful design, use of evidence and clear understanding of implementation risks. Variations to the roadmap were required, however at its highest level, provided Victoria with a pathway out of restrictions, with epidemiology defining each step. This careful, collaborative gradual, evidence-based approach led to Victoria being one of the only jurisdictions globally that effectively eliminated COVID-19 after significant community transmission.

In November 2019, Maritime Safety Victoria (MSV) launched a new platform to improve the safety of boaters and paddlers on Victorian waterways, by helping them make informed safety decisions. Boating Vic was designed to aide trip planning and keep boaters and paddlers up to date while on the water. The app and website provide targeted information relating to more than 400 boat ramps and launching locations across Victoria, including localised marine weather forecasts directly from the Bureau of Meteorology, as well as warnings, notifications, facility information and safety advice from a range of government agencies. Boating Vic also includes ramp and car park cameras currently at 17 locations across Victoria which informs users of the conditions at the ramp before they leave home. These cameras also gather information on ramp usage by counting how many launches are occurring every hour. Since launching, Boating Vic has started to influence behaviour change, thanks to the inbuilt survey, MSV has found that 87% of respondents indicated the app influenced their decision to head out on the water. There have also been more than 17,000 app downloads, 7,000 accounts created, and in excess of one million page views.

The first three years of a child’s life are vital to their future social, educational and health development, and their parents and carers play the single most important role in this period. It is a time of both great opportunity, but also risk, as adverse experiences or stressors can have a lasting, detrimental impact. Play Learn Grow (PLG) was a new program delivered from June to December 2020 to support parents of two and three-year-old children through a particularly challenging year. Almost 14,000 Victorian parents received three SMS messages per week for 24 weeks, containing practical advice and activities to support their child’s learning, development, health and wellbeing at home. Message content was based on expert advice, and each message was crafted using Behavioural Insights to improve resonance and the likelihood of parents acting on the tips. Drawing on a trial conducted in late 2019/early 2020, the Department of Education and Training (DET) quickly rolled-out a wider and tailored version of the program to support parents during the COVID 19 period. The program sought to prompt parenting behaviours shown to support children’s cognitive, and social development, and help support parents through a unique and stressful period.

In March 2020 Sustainability Victoria (SV) embarked upon a transformation co-design process. The purpose of the transformation is to shape our future to realise SV’s potential to deliver impact, insight and agility. The process was co-designed and included two streams. A new organisational architecture with new executive leadership team, and new ways of working. The co-design approach enabled a broad range of individuals to make meaningful contributions, explore a range of possibilities and identify opportunities and solutions that would not otherwise be possible. This goes beyond consultation by building and deepening collaboration between those impacted by a particular change or challenge.

The transformation is designed to enable SV to deliver five key longer-term outcomes for the organisation:

• enable the organisation to deliver on the vision and outcomes of SV’s strategy
• embed cross-organisational leadership, enhance capacity and design leadership pathways
• adopt and embed new ways of working with an agreed desired SV culture to deliver SV’s strategy
• enable a proactive integrated transition of the scale of new programs to be delivered under the Recycling Victoria policy
• be an organisation that can quickly scale up and scale down when required to deliver new services and programs as priorities change and evolve over time.

The climate change, sustainability and health with local government project has been undertaken as part of the wider climate change and health focus area of the statutory Victorian Public Health and Wellbeing Plan. The project focuses on actions communities can take to prepare for climate change and protect their health and those most vulnerable. It highlights how lower carbon ways of living can improve health. For example, walking or cycling instead of taking a car, benefits physical and mental health as well as reducing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. The team recognised the importance of working with local government because of their front-line role in public health and emergency management, connection to communities, and ability to drive change. The project took a bottom-up approach to learn with councils about their successes and challenges, using case studies as a powerful means to share learning. The project has proved popular with many councils engaging, and other organisations keen to hear more, and adapt the materials for their own purposes. A webinar to launch the guidance which was held on 8 October 2020 attracted over 670 attendees from local government and a range of other organisations demonstrating the interest in the subject.

Djakitjuk Djanga is a $2 million grant program for eligible Victorian Aboriginal-owned businesses and organisations to undertake projects that will contribute to the development of an authentic, Traditional Owner-led native food and botanicals industry in Victoria. Agriculture Victoria and the Federation of Victorian Traditional Owner Corporations have worked in partnership under a formal Collaboration Agreement to design and deliver the grant program, which supports 13 Victorian Aboriginal organisations to trial or expand native plant crops for foods and botanicals. Grants are up to $200,000 and there is no requirement for a co-contribution, enabling Aboriginal organisations to overcome some of the barriers they face in pursuing their business aspirations in native foods. The program responds to growing market interest in Australia’s native plant foods and a resurgence by Aboriginal communities in traditional cultural practices including in native food production. A primary objective of the program is to increase leadership by Traditional Owners and other Victorian Aboriginal organisations in Victoria’s native food and botanicals industry. The program places decision making and resources in the hands of the Aboriginal community to determine the direction of this emerging industry, with support from Agriculture Victoria.

In late 2019, Department of Transport (DoT) discussed the opportunity to try and break the mould and do something different. Rather than develop individual self-determination action plans, DoT decided to develop one single plan, the Transport Portfolio Aboriginal Self-Determination Plan 2020-2023. This work was led by DoT and MTIA in partnership with the entities across the transport portfolio. The transport portfolio is comprised of the following organisations: V/Line, VicTrack, Commercial Passenger Vehicles Victoria, Better Boating Victoria, Victorian Fisheries Authority, Transport Safety Victoria, Suburban Rail Loop Authority, and the MTIA project teams. DoT’s vision is to give Victorians from all walks of life access to simple, safe, connected journeys. Aboriginal Victorians and their communities are a critical part of this vision. This plan formalises – for the first time – how DoT’s transport portfolio will work together as one in a coordinated, integrated way to deliver outcomes with, and for, Aboriginal Victorians. By doing this DoT will streamline engagement, enable more informed discussions to occur, and leverage DoT’s whole portfolio, including DoT’s projects, operations, budgets and expertise, to improve outcomes for Aboriginal Victorian communities. Importantly, the Plan commits the portfolio to engaging as one at the local level with Aboriginal stakeholders to identify self-determined solutions to transport issues that matter to them.