Covid-Regulation or a Dirty Question

15 Feb Covid-Regulation or a Dirty Question

Dear Here to Help

On the one hand, government tells us we should/must wear masks, wash our hands with soap and water before drying them, and avoid touching high-touch surfaces. On the other hand, most public (local government) toilets don’t have soap, hand drying facilities and you have to touch multiple doors to enter and exit, can only activate the flush button with your fingers, and taps need to be touched to turn them on and off.

I have even encountered situations where the public toilet hand basins were deactivated, with signs stating that, due to covid these hand basins facilities cannot be used. On the outside of the same toilets were Health notices telling us to wash our hands frequently with soap and water to stay covidsafe. Ironic, given that they had stopped us from washing our hands at all when using the toilet.

Is this a case of government not practising what it preaches?

Thank you for your question.

Public policy is the name we use to describe the way government interacts with the community. Laws are just one example of public policy.

Public policy is comprised of three main parts – “carrots” and “sticks”, which are well known. The third is not talked about as much – its making it easier for people to do the right thing.

We often talk about public policy as a balancing act between “carrots” and “sticks”. Sometimes, government coerces us to do certain things, like wear masks during “lockdown” events, using “sticks” (threat of fines). Other times, government pushes us towards doing certain things, like rebates for solar panels (“carrots”).

The third, more subtle, aspect of public policy. This is about making it as easy as possible for citizens to do the right thing. Let’s imagine that to pay your taxes, the ATO only allowed you to turn up in person, to one office, with cash, on one day of the year. Many people would likely just give up.

Usually, the three aspects work together. Let’s take an example – obeying traffic laws. Just imagine driving if we had no traffic laws – some people would be scared to go on the roads and mortality would increase. Examples of carrots include reduced driver licence renewal fees for drivers with a good driving record. Sticks are things like red light cameras. Finally, government makes it easier for us to obey the road rules with things like signs “keep left” “80 limit” “give way”, “black spot”, “traffic lights ahead”.

Imagine how much harder it would be for us to comply with the traffic laws without these reminders.

Similarly, our ability to maintain covid hygiene would be improved through better, safer, public facilities – door openers and closers, soap, hand towels, finger-free flushing.

Let us hope that covid prompts government to improve the hygiene of public facilities going forward, improving public hygiene just like government helps us better obey traffic laws (and reduce mortality) with improved signage.

This article comes from my column entitled “Here to Help” in Hunter Local, February 2021 https://www.thelocalnewcastle.com.au/. If you have an everyday problem just begging for a simple, real world solution, send it to “Here to Help” and let’s see what we can achieve.

Elaine Abery has a closet full of great ideas and empowering solutions. She’s also the Director of Unravelling Red Tape, a company dedicated to helping everyday people, not-for-profits and companies change the world through improved decision-making and legislation.