A joint parliamentary committee has flagged plans to restrict the ability of future governments to pork-barrel their way to electoral victory.
No,it’s not a scene from Speed,it’s the outtakes from a $2 billion federal spending program that poured money into hundreds of projects in a race to win the 2019 election.
Flagrant breaches of Commonwealth grants rules and unethical behaviour were revealed in the peak audit body’s review of the Coalition scheme.
Given all that is at stake,it is sad that the war for the Voice will be so bitterly fought.
The premier implored the opposition to back new laws to clean up government grants in NSW after it oversaw scandals in bushfire and local council funding that favoured Coalition seats.
Analysis of the multibillion-dollar WestInvest fund reveals some areas received almost 15 times more than their neighbours on a per capita basis.
The revelations threaten to undermine Chris Minns’ election promise to legislate a ban on pork-barrelling and “restore integrity” to government grants.
Former assistant minister Jason Wood has been heavily criticised by Labor for overruling the Department of Home Affairs on the $265 million Safer Communities program.
A breakdown of more than 160 projects promised under the $5 billion Urban Congestion Fund shows 83 per cent of them were aimed at Liberal-held seats.
Former Coalition minister Jason Wood says these were election pledges,not grants.
Federal emergency management minister Murray Watt says the prioritisation of bushfire grants to Coalition seats in NSW was a decision of state cabinet.