Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has fired off a brutal attack on public servants at a closed-door event in Brisbane, in his strongest indication yet of a Coalition plan to slash the APS.
"Wasteful bureaucracy has to go," Mr Taylor told potential donors at a small business forum in Brisbane on Thursday.
"I've been fighting it all my frigging life, and I hate it with a passion ... We have agencies across government right now that do not serve the Australian people the way they should. They serve themselves."
He said there were areas of the public service that could "go immediately" if the Coalition won the next federal election, listing previous examples in housing and climate before revealing a broader intention to overhaul the APS and "get Australia back to where it needs to be," saying: "We can't do that without all of you."
Mr Taylor said he had told every member of his shadow cabinet to "re-write your orders for every agency", understood to mean plan where to make cuts.
The Canberra Times obtained a recording of the comments, made when journalists were not in the room.
Mr Taylor spoke alongside Nationals leader Matt Canavan and Queensland Liberal National Party Senator Paul Scarr at the LNP small business forum at the Diggers Service Club in Logan, a south-east Brisbane suburb in Treasurer Jim Chalmers' electorate of Rankin.
The trio was introduced by Meletios (Mel) Pikos, managing director of Tactic Spaces, a national commercial office fitout company that donated $88,000 to the Liberal National Party in 2024-25 and which sponsored the event.
"It's time to back them in, because small business is the backbone of this country," Pikos said.
Pikos interviewed then opposition leader Peter Dutton on his podcast in 2024, narrowing in on Labor's legislated right to disconnect and workplace flexibility rights. Senator Scarr in turn encouraged attendees to check out the podcast, calling it "absolutely fantastic".
The LNP event in Logan was day three of a roadshow through Queensland by the trio, who spruiked the Coalition's plan to "get government out of the way" by cutting red tape and hacking into the APS, while canvassing the small business community for support.
Finance and Public Service Minister Katy Gallagher blasted the Opposition Leader for his comments.
"Angus Taylor's attacks on the public service confirm that the Liberals will never change when it comes to undermining and politicising the independence of the public service or their plans to sack thousands of public servants," Senator Gallagher said.
"They don't view public servants as workers, they don't back evidence based public policy and they will never back Canberra. We know that. We have seen it at every election and the next one will be no different. Angus Taylor confirmed that [on Thursday]."
ACT Liberal Senate candidate Nick Tyrrell hit back, saying Canberrans "can always rely on Senator Gallagher's tired, well-worn lines and scare campaigns about the APS."
"It was Senator Gallagher and Labor that were exposed by the Independent Parliamentary Budget Office for having plans to cut 41,000 jobs to achieve a budget surplus," Mr Tyrrell said, referring to the PBO analysis that found these job losses were baked into this year's federal budget.
The Liberal Party's internal review of its failed 2025 election campaign found that Mr Dutton's Trump-like attacks on the APS, including its botched messaging on working-from-home and public sector waste, contributed to the disastrous result, which ushered in an enlarged Labor majority.
In his speech on Thursday, Mr Taylor accused the Albanese government of "creeping socialism," warning that "this is how government gets bigger and bigger and bigger."
It was during a question and answer session afterwards that he really let rip.
"My beef at the moment is bureaucracy," an audience member said, asking: "What are we going to do about bureaucrats ... Who are literally doing f--- all? Are we going to see that cut away?"
"These are the areas where we know we can immediately get rid of bureaucratic waste, which is not necessary in this country."
Mr Taylor responded: "If you're in business and you serve yourselves and not your customers, you go out of business."
"It's really simple," he said. "We have to take a business-like approach to what government does. And if we don't, the people must change."
"The net zero bureaucracy - gone," Mr Taylor said. "A housing bureaucracy that's not delivering another house ... Gone. It's going to go."
The Opposition Leader said he had told "every shadow minister in every area of government: 're-write your orders for every agency, whether it's the ATO [Australian Taxation Office], whether it's ASIC [Australian Securities and Investments Commission]'".
"If you're in the energy sector, all these acronyms - NOPSEMA [National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority], AEMO [Australian Energy Market Operator] - the lot of them," Mr Taylor said.
"The number one thing they need to focus on is the national interest, is having an economy that works for Australians, a country that works for Australians.
"And if a bureaucrat is getting in the way of that, they shouldn't be there. It's that simple. This is a business-like approach to government that we desperately need."
