Source : Perth Now news
In the fortnight since it was unearthed and aerated by the Centre for Public Integrity, the federal government’s invite-only $560 million grants fund has drawn criticism from all sides.
The Major and Local Community Infrastructure Program was created by Labor to fund electorate-level campaign promises from the 2025 election.
Good governance groups question the process and decision-making.
The coalition says a juicy $6m golf club redevelopment in Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s electorate “stinks”.
The Greens have fumed over the secrecy involved, while independents lash out at “park barrelling” of promised upgrades to local playgrounds and sports grounds.
Legal experts also suggest the scheme could be unconstitutional.
These threads will all be pulled at a parliamentary committee after Greens senator Steph Hodgins-May secured opposition support to launch a probe.
Behind closed doors, the government is quietly furious scrutiny of the funding round has ballooned.
Mr Albanese was contemptuous of the ABC’s reporting on the matter, telling the public broadcaster on air it should “do better”.
The government is adamant this type of scheme is appropriate for funding election promises – and insists projects must still meet value-for-money tests prescribed in legislation.
At the heart of the issue is tension between an electoral mandate and best practice funding processes.
The government maintains parties should be able to promise funding to groups during an election and, if they win, provide it.
“Ministers are not Daleks which answer to bureaucrats,” one tells AAP.
“We can actually make decisions about these things.”
But Centre for Public Integrity chief executive Catherine Williams says funding decisions should be put to the test before they are promised.
Otherwise, the major parties are engaging in an arms race to fund community projects like men’s sheds, skate parks and swimming pools, where value to taxpayers might not exist.
The integrity centre’s analysis of the funding round earlier in September kickstarted the national conversation around grants probity.
Chief among the areas of concern Dr Williams raises are the lack of assessment behind decisions and questions about access to the funding pot.
“We know nothing about how the invitations went out – nothing at all,” she says.
Infrastructure Minister Catherine King, responsible for approving grants under the scheme, did not respond to AAP’s questions about the process.
Analysis by the integrity centre shows Labor-held seats were over-represented in the carve-up, with a major bias toward marginal electorates.
Guardian Australia reports 92 per cent of the funding delivered so far has gone to projects in Labor seats.
It also shows Victoria, where voters will head to the polls in November, has received more funding than any state, leading to suggestions Canberra is tilting the playing field.
Any coalition attacks on this front might be muted, given it also pledged to fund some of the key projects in question.
Indeed, both major parties have long spent up a storm in the contest for marginal seats that shape government.
Party insiders tell AAP operatives keep track of each other’s promises in key electorates and often match them to neutralise the issue.
This effectively locks in the funding, whoever wins office, with the governing party claiming credit and the opposition keeping them accountable to pay up.
There is also a question of electoral fairness when considering community funding promises.
While major parties can engage in spend-ups, independents and minor parties such as the Greens cannot, given they are realistically unable to claim they might form government and fund them.
In Canberra last week, government figures including federal member for Bruce Julian Hill defended the program.
“Candidates say ‘if I’m elected then we’ll do A B C’ and if you win the election, you’re supposed to deliver on your promise,” he told parliament.
“I didn’t think that was a controversial thing but we now have the opposition and other parts of the parliament out pretending that’s rorting, that that’s corruption.”
University of Sydney professor emerita Anne Twomey is concerned the grants program could also be without legal basis, given the federal government does not have jurisdiction over the projects it sought to fund.
Previous federal government attempts to fund community-level projects – including the notorious “sports rorts” program under former prime minister Scott Morrison – also attracted this charge.
Dr Twomey withdrew that critique on Wednesday after discovering a tweak to the mechanism requiring applicants to partner with a state, territory or local government body to receive and disperse funds.
Sections 96 and 112 of the Australian Constitution allow Canberra to transfer funds to other Australian governments for whatever it “thinks fit”.
“I can’t criticise the funding of a golf course, in this case, as being unconstitutional as I would have otherwise been inclined to do,” Dr Twomey says in a post on her YouTube channel Constitutional Clarion.
“I’m still happy to criticise the grants scheme as being a misuse of government money because the recipients were selected on party political grounds rather than the basis of public need.”
Dr Williams says she doesn’t “have any sympathy for the argument” that politicians could claim a mandate to fund election promises.
“The making of promises using public money when there hasn’t first been a rigorous and independent assessment of the merits of the projects that are the subject of those promises, it’s problematic,” she says.
“The government needs to release this assessment if that exists.”
Dr Twomey also savages this argument, given the legal onus on public procurement to abide by the four Es: efficient, effective, economical and ethical.
“Winning an election does not … sprinkle holy water on such promises, dissolving the requirements of financial legislation and rules,” she says.
