Ali Khan:

The Chief Executive Officer of the Tennant Creek
Town Council has had many things said about him.
Here is his story in his own words ...

My career in Local Government started almost 20 years ago in Pakistan, where my first senior appointment was as the District manager for Kohistan and Director Industries and Services for the region. This is the area which faced a catastrophe - a devastating earthquake, that became the catalyst and paved the way for Kohistan's entry into the modern world.
The earthquake in 1974 took a toll of over 5000 lives and left many thousand injured and homeless. Contributions poured in from 34 countries. The collective sum of over 400 million Rupees was more money than needed to rehabilitate, accordingly a decision was made to undertake extensive development in the region and make this as a settled district of Pakistan.
I started from a scratch to establish 22 village Councils, which included the conducting of local council elections and setting the basic frame-work for their operations. I was there for about five years.
This was a huge task, a challenge not limited to the formation of the Councils but the total transformation of the society itself. We built institutions such as health centres, schools, cottage industries, hydro power stations, hospitals, guest houses and water supply systems. We then undertook the task of training the local people to run these institutions.
My focus was on the youth and the children to bring change in the society because the children not only accepted new ways of hygiene, education and learning skills, they practiced them at home, eventually forcing their elders to adopt them too. This project was declared by the United Nations as a model project and I received the International Year of the Youth Award, which was a great honour.
The year was 1984, the institutions established at that time continued operations and the young boys and girls trained played a critical role in the running of those projects.
The area we are taking about is beside the Old Silk Route connecting Pakistan to China now known as the Karrakuram Highway. Tourism was of immense value to us and accordingly every effort was made to ensure that tourism aspects were considered in the development process.
In 1984 later, I was transferred to the capital, Islamabad where I rose to the position of Director General (Administration) at the age of 29. The City of Islamabad is built on the same model as Canberra.
The City of Islamabad is like Canberra; it is being looked after by the Capital Development Authority, which runs the City management. The authority is responsible for both the state and the Municipal functions. At that time we had a workforce of 10,000 employees and a population of 300,000.
The administration of an organisation of such a magnitude is a big task. One of my major achievements was establishing the first Management Training Academy for the Government employees, catering for the training requirements of all levels of the hierarchy. This was the first institution of its kind working on self-funding principle, operating on commercial basis, declaring its annual profit/loss. The institution generated substantial revenue from membership, marketing of training programs, consultancies and developing training modules, for departments and other agencies around the country. The academy was recognised as one of the best.
I also pioneered the introduction of computerisation in the authority in the early 1980s. Our city was the first to have computerised functions which included Municipal management, establishment matters, finance, payroll and estate managements. After 5 years in Islamabad I moved to Australia in 1988.
In 1981 while I was working in the Kohistan district on the Karakuram Highway, we developed a number of small industries which were excellent training centres. The objective of these centres was to utilise the local raw material and generate some skills training for the students as part of their curriculum. One of the program was carpet weaving, where school children used to come on a daily basis for two hours and undergo training in carpet weaving. This training lasted for 12 months, after which a free loom was installed in their homes.
The boys used to get free raw-material to train the women (mother and sister) at home. The females then utilised their free time to work on the looms to produce a standard rug of 4x6 ft or 3x5 ft. The rug was handed over to the marketing outlet and the household received a cash payment of Rs 500.00 as weaving charges. This became an income generating activity for the females.
The rug was marketed and monies received were ploughed back into the project. This program was so successful that in a short span of time almost 90% of the houses had their own loom. An important breakthrough was achieved when I took the traditional motifs of the region from wood carvings and sketched them in the shape of a design with local colours. The carpet supervisor with the involvement of the students produced this design in shape of a rug. The job was well done and we displayed the carpet in the international exhibition. To our pleasant surprise the design was picked up by an American car company and a significant order was received which turned the fortunes of the area.
The image of the region was enhanced to the degree that the president of Pakistan General Zia-ul-Haq showed interest in the project and received a special briefing. I believe the importance of the project was enhanced as the weaving was done by the students with highly developed skills. We received good recognition and the region was definitely put on the map of Pakistan very prominently.
In Islamabad, when I was working in the Capital Development Authority and established the Management Training Academy, one of the initiatives was to develop a literacy program for adult education. This was for remote areas where education among adults was rare. This syllabus I specifically designed, as a pilot project and we had some adult classes on trial to see how it worked.
When the President visited the academy he inspected the syllabus and the class. The books were special, which one could read with the help of pictures as you go along and you understand what you are talking about. It was very carefully designed. The President was impressed and decided to introduce the project through the Mass Literacy Commission in the country as an initiative of our Academy. Another positive outcome in our training programs in the Academy itself was interaction. As I mentioned before, we had designed courses which catered for the training needs of all levels of the management. The objective was to minimise the communication gap between the superiors and the subordinates, and make them feel part of the team.
Again, when you're talking of a work force 10,000, there were people who were working for over ten years, and came across first time in one of the trainees course sitting together. It was a unique experience where at the start of the course you could introduce people who had been working for the Municipal Management Directorate for the last seven years, say, and they had never met each other because there was no interaction.
So the Academy provided the platform where they came together and exchanged their experiences, learned the new technology and the modern concepts of management. The application of new concepts was now easy as more communication was possible in the office. It was at that time that I was awarded the President's Pride of Performance Award.
What did you do when you came to Australia?
I did my PhD in Development Economics at Latrobe University in Melbourne. At the same time I also completed my Masters in Business Administration and my qualifications as a Municipal Clerk in Local Government from Victoria. I previously had a Masters degree in Public Administration and a Bachelor in Political Science when I came to Australia.
My view was that a Business degree is more marketable in Australia compared to any other degree, especially in Local Government. The combination works very well and that's why I under took an MBA. At that time I did a few jobs in financial institutions and Local Council till the time I finished my degree. I then joined the Orbost Water Board in the area of Finance and Administration, I worked as an accountant.
I then moved to Queensland where I was the Deputy Shire Clerk on the Tablelands before coming to Tennant Creek as a Town Manager and CEO. So it has been a gradual progression.
What do you see as the challenge for Tennant Creek? What's your strategy do deal with it?
I think having the experience of working in three States, what I can say is, that at the time when I joined Local Government in Victoria the industry was going through a period of reforms. Amalgamation was the main item, which led to progressive reforms like competitive tendering and restructuring of services, rationalisation of programs, corporate planning. I was very well introduced to some of these issues in Pakistan. We had our corporate planning done ten years ago, which started in the eighties in Australia. I went through this process in Victoria and then in Queensland.
So coming to Tennant Creek, I think the biggest challenge was to start from scratch because these reforms at that stage were not initiated in NT. It's now that we are coming to grip with these changes and the reforms in the Local Government. Tennant Creek Town Council I believe, was in some way, the first Council to work on these programs. Now all municipal Councils, are almost on the same platform as we look towards the reform agenda of Local Government, which is being supported by the NT Government. We commenced Corporate Planning in 1995 as a fully fledged exercise. Outsourcing was another major challenge, We successfully introduced contracts and the results speak for themselves. Restructuring of our Financial Management was the biggest issue that had to be addressed. I must mention that Financial Restructuring is not an overnight change that you can expect. It is a strategy that you put in place for a period. Our Council has a ten year plan which is being implemented, and the results in the first four and a half years are encouraging and according to what we predicted. The Government and the Department are pleased with the progress the council has achieved to date. Restructuring of the organisation, rationalisation of services, and introduction of the program based budgeting are all the things that were part of the challenge. Now we are looking at quality assurance, which has commenced recently. Our target is that by the end of the year 2000 we should be able to achieve accreditation for the Council in its operations. Again we must keep in mind that because of the financial constraints, the workload has increased on the staff which requires added effort to achieve results. This exercise of rationalisation and outsourcing has given us economic efficiency as well as a cost effectiveness.
Do you think if Tennant continues to decline we will get less and less slice of the Government pie, in terms of Municipal Grants?
Yes, because the Federal Assistance Grant is based on per capita. We have to bear in mind that even if our population remains steady, say 3,800, and the population of other centres like Palmerston, Darwin and Alice goes up, the per capita income to us will be reduced because the pie is the same from which you are getting the slice.
But having said that, I think we have to work on strategies which we believe can raise other avenues of revenue, and how we can make our services more cost effective. In this regard outsourcing was one of the areas we preferred because the results to date indicate that our costs are reduced, efficiency has increased based on the output which is easily measurable in quantitive terms. If you look at the animal control functions, or the dump you see the figures stacked very well.
Has animal control been outsourced?
Yes it is. The costs are reduced compared to the past considerably, the benefits are that you have a person on call 24 hours. The output in terms of the number of dogs registered at present is over 526 compared to a year ago - 226. The revenue from fees and fines has increased from $200 to $2,000; so the figures speak for themselves. These are the sort of initiatives we have to take when we find that our income is reducing from anyone source.
Is the principal of outsourcing that private enterprise can actually do a lot of things more efficiently than a council can?
I have no doubt in that. But it depends on what sort of function you are talking. Over here outsourcing is performance based, linked to an incentive where we have given an individual from the private sector to take over a function, which has shown extra ordinary results.
And that can bring a greater flexibility?
Exactly. And the benefit to the Council is that we don't have to have an employee with overtime or flexi hours. This is where we cut our costs. I don't say that people in the Council can't do the job, they are all working very hard and performing over and above their normal expectation. But there are areas which you feel the private sector can do better, and create more employment.
And do you want to outsource household collection?
We have called for expressions of interest. The Council is working on specification documents. If it is a cost effective proposition, yes, we would consider it. But again there would be no loss of employment because the staff who are currently responsible for garbage collection will be part of that changeover, the jobs will be taken over by the private sector. So no-one will lose their job.
But they might change employers, is that what you mean?
Yes, that's the way it works. For example a company ABC takes over the household collection. Part of our arrangement will be that we have the employee transferred to the payroll of the private company. I believe that the employee will be better off as the private sector pays them much better than us. From the Councils point of view, we will receive more efficiency and cost effectiveness.
How long do you think it will be before the Council will be debt free? Is that in your ten year plan?
Yes, around the year 2006 is our target date. Allow me to explain that the restructure we did between 1996/97 is based on reducing our debt every month on a regular basis directly through the bank. We were paying a very high interest rate in 1995 up to 16.95%. When we re-negotiated our loans we bought the interest down to 7.54% and 8.6% fixed for ten years and based on low rates we actually cut our interest expense by almost 400,000 over the ten-year period. If we proceed on this principle and do not take any new loans we should achieve our goal.