New policy advice
The Department of Finance has released new policy advice to help departments and regulators meet the government’s objective to improve productivity.
This advice explains:
- when to reissue Ministers’ Statements of Expectations (SOEs) and regulators’ Statements of Intent (SOIs)
- what to include in these statements.
Departments should aim to support your Minister to reissue SOEs by the end of 2025. This includes providing briefings and strategic advice. You may also need to prioritise or sequence the order of SOEs that will be reissued if your Minister is responsible for more than one regulator. You will need to review and update existing statements to make sure they reflect the government’s productivity objective. If a regulator does not have an SOE yet, you will need to create one.
Regulators should aim to issue their SOIs as soon as possible after the SOE is reissued.
Purpose of SOEs and SOIs
Statements of Expectations (SOEs) and Statements of Intent (SOIs) help improve how regulators operate. They show what the government wants regulators to focus on and expectations for how regulators should perform.
The Australian Government recommends Ministers and Commonwealth regulators use these statements to make regulatory work more open and accountable.
The Regulator Performance – Resource Management Guide (RMG) 128 on the Finance website has guidance on issuing SOEs and SOIs.
Government productivity priority
Improving Australia’s productivity performance is a key priority for the government. The government has set a whole-of-government policy objective for Commonwealth regulators to better balance risk mitigation with efficiency, growth and dynamism, requiring Ministers’ SOEs to address this.
More information
Finance will update RMG 128 shortly with information about how departments can support Ministers to address the policy advice.
Download the Ministerial Statements of Expectations and responding regulator Statements of Intent – Prioritising Productivity Policy advice.
Contact
For further information or support, please contact: APSRegulatoryReform@finance.gov.au
