Looking at past Liberal Party of Australia political rorts may help to assess Scott Morrison's current election campaign promises which have a dollar amount attached when first announced and/or a specific electorate is included in the announcement.
So what has all the Liberal Party's much touted "individual freedom and free enterprise" delivered since 2013?
Well between 2013 and 2018 it appears to have delivered federal regional grants totally $714,563,851. With 57.62% of this funding directed to 77 Coalition-held electorates and, the remaining 26.92% going to 74 other electorates - 68 ALP & 6 minor party/independent.
Some electorates such as Hinkler (Qld) held by Nats-LNP since 1993 received well in excess of $26 million in regional grants. Mallee (Vic) held by Nats since 1972 and Capricornia (Qld) held by LNP since 2013 received over $24 million each. While Dawson (Qld) held by LNP since 2010 received over $31 million - and on it went over the approximately six year span.
Has this brazenly partisan allocation of Treasury funds lessened under the prime ministership of the Liberal MP for Cook?
Apparently not, because the bulk of the billions listed in the next paragraph were distributed on Morrison's watch.
According to The Sydney Morning Herald on 16 April 2022, taxpayers have funded $55.6 billion in federal government grants over less than 4 years (including a hefty $20 billion last year) under rules that give ministers sweeping powers to decide payments, often without any criteria or reporting & against departmental advice. From January to March this year another $1 billion was distributed as grants.
So where might some of those $55.6 billion dollars have found a home?
Nor being a forensic accountant I am not up to the task of tracking that down, but there are some clues to be found.
Take the joint Federal-States Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Grants Program.
The “Black Summer” bushfire season actually ran from July 2019 through to early March 2020 and during this period est. 2.9 million adult Australians had their property damaged, their property threatened, or had to be evacuated, often along with their families.
This Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Grants Program funding pool held $390,893,779 – with $296,746,274 allocated and $94,147,508 still unspent in February 2021.
Over 100 local government areas in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria were listed in the grant eligibility criteria.
A total of 57.63% of all grant allocations worth est. $171,035,576 went to Coalition electorates, 31.33% worth $92,994,495 to Labor electorates and, 11.02% worth $32,716,230 to Independent/minor party electorates.
In December 2020 it was revealed that one of Australia's richest men who happens to be a Liberal Party donor had received $10 million in bushfire recovery funding - to expand a paper mill not directly affected by fire.
In February 2022 the Morrison Government announced that the Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Fund had received an additional $110 million for 524 "broad recovery projects" with unspecified recipients. The this grants program is now listed as closed.
Just in case a reader might think that the nature of that 2019-2020 mega bushfire season might have skewed funding allocations, here is another example which clearly indicates bias.
Round 5 of the Building Better Regions Fund – Infrastructure Projects Stream.
There it is in glorious colour.
A total of 73. 23% of this grant round, worth est. $215,281,617 going to Coalition electorates and 26.76% worth est. $78,678,728 going to electorates held by Labor and the cross benches. Liberal & LNP MPs receiving the bulk of this largesse held federal seats in New South Wales and Queensland.
Then there is the National Commuter Car Park Fund.
The Urban Congestion Fund (UCF) was established in the 2018–19 Budget. Total funding for the UCF had grown from $1 billion to $4.8 billion as at 31 March 2021.The National Commuter Car Park Fund is a component of the UCF.
This is what commuter car park funding allocation looked like in February 2021.
A total of 77 Liberal Party electorates received a whopping 81.75% of the total funding pool worth $575,890,000. Among the Liberal Party luminaries lining up for the prime minister’s largesse were; Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong Vic), Alan Tudge (Aston Vic), Tim Wilson (Goldstein Vic), Michael Sukkar (Deakin Vic), Jason Wood (La Trobe Vic), Angus Taylor (Hume NSW), David Colman (Banks NSW), Stuart Robert (Fadden Qld), Bert Van Manen (Forde Qld) Peter Dutton (Dickson Qld) and Andrew Hastie (Canning WA).
In June 2021 the Australian Auditor-General handed down a performance report titled “Administration of Commuter Car Park Projects within the Urban Congestion Fund”.
The performance report found numerous inadequacies, including:
at 31 March 2021, there had been 44 commuter car park projects announced involving upgrades at 47 identified sites with a total Australian Government funding commitment of $660.4 million;
assessment work had been completed for 10 car parks resulting in $100 million of Australian Government funding being approved for the full project (including delivery of construction work). Construction had been completed at two sites and had commenced at a further three sites;
The Department of Infrastructure’s administration of the commuter car park projects within the Urban Congestion Fund was not effective;
The department’s approach to identifying and selecting commuter car park projects for funding commitment was not appropriate. It was not designed to be open or transparent. The department did not engage with state governments and councils, which increased the risk that selected projects would not deliver the desired outcomes at the expected cost to the Australian Government. Departmental advice did not contain an assessment against the investment principles or policy objectives and it was not demonstrated that projects were selected on merit. The distribution of projects selected reflected the geographic and political profile of those given the opportunity by the government to identify candidates for funding consideration; and
The selection of 47 commuter car park sites for funding commitment were decisions of government taken over the period January to July 2019 and:
effected in 38 cases (81 per cent) by the written agreement of the Prime Minister to a written request from Ministers;
effected in seven cases (15 per cent) by the election commitment process; and
in two cases (four per cent) the department had not evidenced how the funding commitment was effected, beyond email advice from the Minister’s Office and a media announcement by the Prime Minister. [my yellow highlighting]
By 2022 it was apparent that most of 47 commuter car parks which had funding allocated were no longer considered active proposals and at least 5 proposed car parks appear to have been scrubbed from the original list – 4 in Labor electorates and one in a Liberal Party electorate.
Lack of transparency, across the board poor record keeping, no apparent accountability for decisions made and politically partisan use of public money - are all indicators of corrupt processes in this particular grant fund.
This next chart demonstrates funding allocations for sports infrastructure.
A breakdown of full details can be found at:
https://www.thevogfiles.com/uploads/1/3/5/1/135189168/copy_of_sporting_grants5_1.xlsx
To say that voters are not happy with the Liberal Party is an understatement. This was one voter in the Australian Capital Territory......
“Firstly, the biggest misdirect, perhaps lie, perpetrated by the Liberals is that they are a Federal Political Party - a single administrative & policy unit like the ALP. They are a bunch of independent Fiefdoms, ruled in what looks like a Feudal system with a truly byzantine organisation…..
I’ve looked at the Liberal Federal Secretariat & "Liberal Party NSW" sites and they don’t publish any “Values”,
They publish some very rubbery & loose “Beliefs”. Untestable, and unaccountable motherhood statements. Summarised at the end as:
“In short, we believe in individual freedom and free enterprise"
Tony Abbott around 2013 clearly annunciated both Liberal Party Values & Purpose: “We are not Labor”.
Nobody in their right mind would invest in a company with the absence of proper Governance & Accountability embodied in the many “Liberal” party Fiefdoms in Australia, nor would they tolerate the absence of consistent Values, Priorities and Policies.” [Voter from Kippax, ACT, 3 March 2022]
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