Today's Age is reporting that Department of Transport and Planning Secretary Paul Younis will stand down at the end of the year after 6 years at the helm. We don't know why he's leaving and there has been no official announcement as yet, with the Age relying on advice from an internal email.
First some background. Mr Younis took over from Richard Bolt who resigned after being left out of the planning for the Suburban Rail Loop. Under Bolt there was Gillian Miles as Transport for Victoria head (one of the many names that staff have worked under due to almost continual restructuring in the transport portfolio).
Before them, when PTV was its own entity, were the three Britishers - Dobbs, Wild and Weimar - all of whom had public transport operational experience (unlike later leaders). Even further back was another in Jim Betts, who will be remembered by staff long after most other Secretaries have been forgotten.
Younis' time spans three approximately equal periods; pre, during and post pandemic. He came to his position during the heyday of low interest rate-fuelled 'Borrow Big, Build Big' thinking in 2018 when anything in transport seemed possible. Today's environment is different, with the 3 Hs - higher interest rates, health system stress and a housing crisis - dominant.
In June I described Mr Younis as an introverted civil engineer who hides his light under a bushel. Leaving almost all public appearances to his ministers, the man is intensely private and publicly available video footage of him is rare. This is despite him heading a major public service department with stewardship over billions of taxpayer dollars. The main time the public can see him in action is during streamed budget estimates hearings (see 17, 20 & 21 May 2024 transcripts).
The manner of how the Secretary's departure became known matches his modesty with news coming out via what appears to be a staff email. Places I'd be looking at for official announcements, including word of the successor, include the premier's media releases and Government Gazette.
The new secretary
Utopia jokes aside, who does the new Secretary need to be?
In one line, I would suggest "a tough cookie who rides the bus".
The toughness is needed to confront things that Younis didn't or couldn't. And the bus riding would help the secretary feel and show empathy with users and passengers.
Younis might have been a 'safe pair of hands' but his time also had some missed opportunities. His low public profile also meant that our network lacked an ambassador to speak for it at important times (think an Andy Byford or Randy Clarke).
Despite there being unprecedented state funding for transport projects, only a fraction ended up in those that his department directly managed. The big politically-important projects were spun off into dedicated well-resourced delivery agencies like LXRP and SRLA, leaving DTP with the scraps. There was inevitably some overlap but the record shows that integration between Big Build projects and DTP functions like rail timetable or bus reform was patchy and hardly ever happened.
Transport leaders elsewhere deftly used the pandemic as an opportunity to advocate for or reconfigure timetables to favour the new trends in off-peak usage. We got a little of that with some revised tram timetables. But Younis was unable to translate this into outcomes for metropolitan trains on our busiest or highest needs lines. These continue to have sharp frequency cliffs at important times.
Despite having a Bus Plan in 2021 (that Minister Carroll made a public release) and a team of people responsible, Younis was unable to make the case to Cabinet or Treasury for it to get 2023 or 2024 state budget funding. It can't all be put down to government parsimony since 2024 was a successful year for the much less resourced #Fix800Bus campaign. However DTP can claim success in obtaining conditional fixed term funding for growth area buses via the GAIC.
It is known that there are certain bus network inefficiencies that could have been tackled for 'greater good' improvements if the will existed. Some of these were fixed but many big ones remain for the picking.
If I was Treasury I would mark departments heavily on whether they defended their revenue streams or had a program to fund improvements from internal efficiencies. Furthermore, I would oppose their budget bids until they did so. DTP cannot necessarily claim to have maximised opportunities here.
In public transport such actions might have included cutting unnecessary costs (eg looking at administration overheads, getting better value from operator contracts, cutting out unnecessary activities or streamlining the network), minimising losses (eg cutting fare evasion), maximising patronage (through greater good network and service reform, good information and marketing).
The new secretary needs to be resolute in doing more with less, including offering up ideas to do that to ministers. This includes asking confronting hitherto 'sacred cow' questions, like whether staffing some stations with both internal and PSO staff at night is excessive, with higher evening frequencies a better use for the money. This is just a random example - what's important is that the thinking process must be there. Going the other way, there may be scope for ministers to demand more from the department, and not take 'we don't have the funding' for granted.
No person is an island. One Secretary (even if they get $500k pa) can't do everything. They need to delegate and inspire. That attracts loyalty and retention of the best people. Such encouragement of initiative and continuity is important for DTP to address the performance, quality and efficiency issues that have affected some of its functions. Inspiration from the top needn't cost anything; having staff at home seeing their Secretary on the TV or other media selling the department's good work (or even denying an incorrect claim) can be a real morale booster.
Five priorities for the new secretary
1. Sweat the assets / maximise community benefit / frequency first
The recent emphasis has been on building infrastructure. Much less so on working it hard to maximise its community benefits all week. For instance we have removed level crossings and new stations but the trains are often still only every 20, 30 or 40 minutes at important times people wish to travel. Newish stations like Cardinia Rd or Southland haven't yet got complementary reformed bus networks. Ditto for northern suburbs stations like Preston or Reservoir, where buses every 22-24 minutes cannot evenly meet trains every 20 minutes. With many projects now built, maximising asset utilisation may need to take over from new construction as top priority given how tight budgets are now. This is especially so given that (unlike Sydney) Melbourne has let its per capita service fall over time.
2. Fix bus services / reform the backlog
The cheapest upgrades require internal process reform so that we can get simple stuff done as quickly as we know Perth does. This recent Healesville example shows we can do it, with only the scale and pace lacking. Fixing this requires attention to streamlining processes and building capability in certain areas. Larger service upgrades will need external funding. This calls for an ability to advocate within government for extra service resourcing, especially noting the cost of living and housing choice benefits of same.
Focus is important. That includes avoiding fads like flexible route buses that distract from what's really important to move the numbers needed. And while not themselves without merit, initiatives like bus recontracting and electrification must never usurp the basics of good service including adequate coverage, direct routes, long hours and high frequencies that are core to growing patronage.
3. Rebuild passenger confidence / excel with service / expect better from operators
As more projects get completed interest needs to shift to providing good service to rebuild confidence and grow patronage. 'Good service that's worth paying for' should be the motto. Perhaps unavoidably lines like Frankston have been shut down for so much of the last five years that patronage has suffered as there is no certainty as to whether there are trains or not. Also, as noted above, passengers have got fewer benefits from completed infrastructure projects than they should have.
Better reliability has been touted as one benefit of removing level crossings and renewing rail infrastructure. However, for reasons unexplained, we have yet to achieve the same operational performance that we had between 2000 and 2003. Success here will be a major achievement for the new secretary if they can pull this off.
4. Set a patronage target / promote the network
When was the last time you heard a DTP secretary articulate a patronage growth target for public transport? Or even go on talkback radio to advocate the benefits of taking public transport? Whatever his other skills, the existing media-shy Secretary has been a terrible salesperson for the network.
There is a risk that seeing this from the top sets the tone for the rest of the department and expectations of its people. Although a franchise operator can be removed for poor performance, there is not that same accountability if DTP performs its functions poorly. Passenger information, including for disruptions, real time for buses and public holiday service arrangements, are opportunities for improvement as errors and inaccuracies are too common. So is promotion of new or upgraded services, with a tendency to either not articulate or undersell the sometimes substantial passenger benefits.
5. Defend revenue / Get passengers paying again
During the pandemic (when myki top-ups were removed) DTP lost control of bus fare evasion and has not regained it since (even denying there's a problem). This culture has led to new expectations (including amongst drivers) that make the problem hard to unscramble, especially for Labor governments with affiliated transport unions they need to please. But letting fare evasion go unchecked is costing revenue and public confidence in the competence of network leadership.
It's not all DTP's fault. Politicians from both sides have fiddled with the fare system for their political gain. This has led to a network with an unfortunate combination of (a) the free tram zone, (b) excessively cheap long distance fares, (c) excessively expensive fares for short trips and (d) a perverse incentive for train travellers to fill station car parks early (due to the single-mode Early Bird fares). It could be argued that this, plus sometimes lax fare enforcement and poor service levels, has led to a culture of 'you pretend to pay while we pretend to provide a service' amongst some.
Summary
As you can see there's lots to do here with a challenging fiscal outlook and a state election in 2026. But there's also a lot of opportunity to make the most of our (now enlarged) infrastructure. Let's hope the government chooses wisely so we get the right secretary to provide the leadership needed.
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