The survey research draws on the notion of political trust as a relational concept about “holding a positive perception about the actions of an individual or an organisation” (OECD 2017: 16) that requires “keeping promises and agreements” (Hethrington 2005: 1). In addition, we consider trust as a psychological contract between the individual and the organisation as “expectations and obligations” (Cullinane and Dundo., 2006; Rousseau 2001); and simultaneously as a social contract between government and citizens involving rights and obligations. This has commanded the attention of political philosophers since the 17th century from Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, to Rawls and Gauthier, amongst others. We hypothesize that in combination, trust comprises of various micro-psychological contracts between government and citizens that encompass expectations of service culture, quality and obligations and entitlements of citizenship.
It is important to recognize the three different components of trust that operate in a liberal democracy:
- Trust occurs when A trusts that B will act on their behalf and in their interests to do X in particular and more generally.
- Mistrust occurs when A assumes that B may not act on their behalf and in their interests to do X but will judge B according to information and context. This definition is associated with the notion of a critical citizen and active citizenship and is viewed to strengthen democracy.
- Distrust occurs when A assumes that B is untrustworthy and will cause harm to their interests in respect of X or more generally.
In contrast to mistrust, distrust is viewed to weaken democracy and confidence in government.
We asked focus group participants to describe what a trusted public service meant to them. They were uniform in emphasising the importance of:
- Integrity (“honesty”, “transparency”, “consistency”, “say what you do” or procedural fairness).
- Empathy (“care”, “respect”, “understanding”).
- Delivery (“do what you say”); and, more surprisingly
- Loyalty (to “have your back”, expectation for institutional paternalism).
These observations help to validate our understanding of the various micro-psychological contracts between government and citizen that encompass expectations of service culture, quality and obligations and entitlements of citizenship. Above all, public trust in government services is earned by delivering (‘Do what you say’) on the service promise (‘Say what you do’) in a way that values and respects citizens’ rights and input.
In general, our regional focus group findings validate the findings of the Citizen Experience Survey and provide greater detail on the factors informing citizen perceptions. For example:
- Trust in politicians in general remains very low and declining political trust does impact on all aspects of citizen trust in government (trust in government services, service satisfaction and confidence in the problem-solving capability of federal government).
- Trust in government services declines by social income and individual and community capability.
- Citizens are less likely to trust services that form part of government policies that they disagree with.
- Negative personal and network experiences of the significant effort required to access complex services diminishes trust.
- Many informants had a negative experience of the service culture except for simple transactional services.
- Digital service delivery is often the preferred channel for simple transactional services for those with capacity and access to digital technology. For complex services, mixed channels of service delivery are crucial. The more complex the service, the greater the need for consistent human support and advocacy.
- Citizens do not distinguish between different levels of government unless prompted; they just see government and expect jurisdictions of government to collaborate effectively.
APS leaders were not surprised by the results of the Citizen Experience Survey but did identify several mitigating factors that need to be considered in any response. Firstly, constitutionally the APS cannot address the problem of declining political trust and by implication the role of politicians; although it clearly impacts on public perceptions of the quality of public service delivery. The focus of the APS effort should therefore be on improving the quality of service delivery; a task within the APS’s remit of responsibility. Secondly, citizens are less likely to trust services that form part of government policies that they disagree with; hence you will never be able to please everybody. Thirdly, Australians have high expectations of service delivery that might be difficult to meet given budgetary constraints. They expect to have the same quality of experience with public and private sector service providers. It is therefore important to establish a public expectation thesis i.e. given prevailing constraints what could the service provider reasonably be expected to achieve? Fourthly, accessing complex services requires significant effort due to legislative requirements which is likely to lead to diminished trust. The incremental impact of targeting to contain costs has inevitably led to more complex service delivery. Fifthly, many services that Australians receive are, in David Thodey’s terms, “seamless” and “invisible” (e.g. PBS, Medicare), but because they do not involve formal evaluation touchpoints go unrecognised by the citizen.