Heigh-ho: from a golden age of policymaking to our winter of discontent

Once upon a time, the so-called ‘Seven Dwarfs’ ruled the then-Commonwealth Public Service with rods of Australian-manufactured steel.

They were a group of department heads who were not of large stature physically but were giants in the post-war reconstruction years – a period often dubbed the ‘golden age’ of public administration.

They were Dr HC ‘Nugget’ Coombs, Sir John Crawford, Sir Roland Wilson, Sir Allen Brown, Sir Henry Bland, Sir Richard Randall and Sir Frederick Shedden, although there was some dispute about whether he was the seventh, partly because he stood at five feet and seven inches in Imperial measure, while the others barely reached five feet three.