A timeless classic of gender and federal politics. Ministers came and went and reappeared, seeking to lay their hands on a splendid prize. The machinery of government. It is 1977, two years after Australia’s constitutional crisis. The bureaucrats in West Block, home of the prime minister’s department, are recovering from the shock of Gough Whitlam’s dismissal. George Harland schemes to preserve his departmental standing; Henry Beeker stakes his career on stalling a policy; Catherine Duffy risks her life rescuing victims of an ill-conceived one; Jonathan Roe sets off the tripwires in textbook economics. And Cassie Armstrong, head of the department’s women’s unit, is driven to despair.
Life is tense in West Block. Pigeons nest in the leaking roof. A move is imminent: it’s feared the government plans to tear the building down. Old time bureaucrats are adjusting to a new, feminist presence in its corridors. At one time or other housing most of the federal public service, West Block is more than just a rundown office building. Here is the nation in microcosm.
With sensitivity and humour, Dowse has added features and soul to the faceless image of the public servant.
- Australian