It is a scary thought, but roughly 30% of our economy (Public sector expenditure) is subject to the disciplines of neither the market or democracy. 

Bureaucracies are institutions that thrive on complexity, it is far easier to make an existing process more complex, than to take it apart and re-engineer it to make it more simple, and rarely is a process ditched, just leave it on the books in case it assists at some point, to frustrate  somebody trying to do something useful that seeks to adjust the status quo.

This thought  makes the addition of another bureaucratic process on to the management of the national health system, as agreed by our Federal and State pollies over the past week as a substitute for genuine reform of the system, even more scary.

None of the apparent root causes of the current mess have been addressed, they have just been moved around a bit, and political sweeteners (read, our tax dollars) have been added to provide the façade of improvement.

All that has happened is that a few more deckchairs have been added to the slippery sloping deck, and the colours have been mixed up a bit to make a better photograph.