The message came swift and clear not long after the Governor-General swore in Anthony Albanese. Labor's new government would respect, not sack, public servants, the new Prime Minister said.
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The promise was one of Mr Albanese's first in government, being among his first remarks in his first press conference as PM. On the slow-moving time-scale of the public service, he couldn't have made it much quicker.
No one was expecting a new Labor government to wield an axe to the body of the public service, as John Howard did after his 1996 election win.
Mr Albanese's combination of praise and promise this morning was about setting a tone for the new government's dealings with public servants. It will be heard keenly in hallways, meeting rooms and offices around Canberra.
"We'll be valuing public servants and respecting them," he said, noting their work in helping him arrange the first steps of the new government.
"And the fact that we were able to have discussions and put measures in place to allow whatever the outcome of the result on Saturday for those arrangements to be put in place, says a lot about how professional our public service are. We should not take it for granted."
What will speak loudest is Mr Albanese's revelation that senior bureaucrat Stephanie Foster was acting as head of the Prime Minister's Department. Its secretary Phil Gaetjens is on leave. It's convention for a new prime minister to select their own secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. However Mr Gaetjens' departure appears to be happening especially fast.
Again, after Mr Albanese's recent election campaign comments that he would replace Mr Gaetjens, this is no surprise.
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It is the speed of the apparent departure that speaks loudest, showing the change of government on Saturday will manifest quickly in Canberra.
Public servants will learn in coming days and weeks whether the change will be as comprehensive as it is fast. It could spell the end for other senior bureaucrats. Having learnt from Kevin Rudd's decision not to sack departmental heads in 2007, this Labor government can be expected to show more openness to personnel changes in the bureaucracy's top echelons.
Mr Albanese's unqualified praise for bureaucrats this morning will sound unfamiliar, but refreshing, after an election campaign where former prime minister Scott Morrison turned on public servants.
Towards the end of the campaign in particular, Mr Morrison appeared to forget the respect his government acquired for the public service throughout the pandemic, lapsing into his "Canberra bubble"-style rhetoric in a desperate attempt for electoral gain.
He threw the federal Health Department under the bus, effectively blaming it for the shambolic vaccine rollout and saying he regretted not putting Lt General John Frewen in charge earlier.
Then, questioned about pork barrelling, he argued MPs were better placed to decide on grants for community projects than public servants, who he painted as out-of-touch pen pushers in Canberra. And, the Coalition announced $2.7 billion in cuts to public service budgets in the form of a larger efficiency dividend. Thanks for all your work, indeed.
Mr Morrison's mantra for the public service was "respect and expect". The election campaign showed his respect for public servants ran too shallow.
The new prime minister says his runs deeper.
As they say, start as you mean to go on. The coming weeks and months will tell public servants more about the new regime in town, and how it regards them.
