Every crisis response involves people and organisations working together under stress to solve common problems, and this requires cooperation and trust. Australia’s pandemic response relied heavily on a number of key pre‑existing relationships to achieve outcomes. However, the response suffered when relationships were prioritised over formal structures – or where relationships did not exist prior to the pandemic.

Relationships within government

In the absence of formal emergency management structures, trusted relationships were relied on throughout the pandemic to break down barriers and deliver required outcomes. This accounted for some of the most significant achievements during the pandemic response, with Australia being well served by a number of key individuals with high levels of capability, existing networks and experience. This approach was successful in areas where strong working relationships were already in place, such as between key economic agencies, with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders, or in areas which had recently been involved in delivering responses in other emergencies, such as the 2020 bushfires.

However, a reliance on relationships in lieu of planning and governance structures had an impact on the efficiency and effectiveness of the Australian Government’s response. The tendency to rely on trusted relationships created a bias towards tasking some departments with additional roles that would have sat better with other departments. A reliance on senior officials to drive the response by using their relationships was also unsustainable in a long crisis and led to fatigue and may have contributed to increased turnover of staff post‑pandemic.

The existence of relationships was sometimes not enough to negotiate the challenge of developing the pandemic response. Within the Australian Public Service, the absence of a visible emergency governance structure led to a lack of clarity regarding roles and responsibilities – especially which agencies should lead on specific issues.

Relationships outside government

The pandemic response required not just a whole‑of‑government but a whole‑of‑society response. Governments needed to work closely with unions, businesses, and community groups to address challenges throughout the pandemic.

Where relationships already existed, these could be quickly and effectively leveraged to manage the response. In some cases, this was supported by formal structures. For example, the electricity, fuel and gas sectors each had longstanding emergency management arrangements that could quickly focus on issues raised during the pandemic. The energy sector and its emergency management arrangements had recently been tested by the 2019‑2020 bushfires and through cyber exercises. Similarly, strong relationships with the Aboriginal community‑controlled health sector built over many years were integral to a rapid response to prevent outbreaks among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

However, there were many areas where relationships were not as strong or well established. Formal tripartite arrangements between employers, employees and government had been limited for a number of years – which, given the heavy unionisation of essential workers during the pandemic, created a key weakness in the response. The Minister for Industrial Relations took an active role in addressing these gaps at senior levels.

Relationships with business were also somewhat ad hoc and not coordinated through any formal mechanisms. This changed with the establishment of the Coronavirus Business Liaison Unit in Treasury, providing an important connection that remains in use today. We also heard that the Treasurer took initiative in solving some key issues with senior business leaders throughout the pandemic, leveraging existing relationships.

The Prime Minister was quick to recognise that gaps existed with regard to relationships critical to the pandemic response and established the National COVID‑19 Coordination Commission (NCCC). The NCCC played an important role during the alert phase of the pandemic, with members leveraging pre‑existing networks to solve a number of high‑profile issues. However, as other mechanisms – including the National Coordination Mechanism – were established during the pandemic, its usefulness diminished.

Relationships also were non-existent between some key industries, unions and public health officials. This meant that industry often struggled to communicate with the relevant officials about risks posed by public health orders, including to critical supply chains. While relationships were developed during the pandemic, these have not been maintained, and there is a risk that similar issues will resurface in the future. We heard from stakeholders that if there was a pandemic tomorrow, Australia would be back at square one.

Community organisations played a critical role in the pandemic, providing support to individuals across Australia. This was often done without the coordination or involvement of government. However, these efforts were often not effectively leveraged to improve the overall pandemic response. There would be value in better leveraging the immense capacity of the community sector in a future pandemic, which should involve including the sector in planning and preparedness activities.

The establishment of advisory bodies during the pandemic was welcomed, and improved the response for some priority cohorts. However, advisory bodies for some cohorts were established too late, and would have been more effective had they been in place prior to the pandemic.

Links between academia and government were also difficult to establish once the crisis was underway and there were limited opportunities to formalise commissioning research and researcher engagement. NSW Health was the only public health department with a more formal portal for researcher engagement that allowed them to extend their research capacity and access technical capability to generate actionable insights.

In the case of infectious disease statistical modelling, existing working relationships between modellers and the Australian Government were extended to include COVID‑19 related modelling. This allowed the rapid commissioning of modelling work with some of Australia’s most experienced infectious disease modellers. That said, the heavy reliance on prior relationships rather than formal processes limited access to the breadth of external expertise, and led some to question to the process.