Sophie Scamps (Mackellar, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the member for Indi so eloquently put it, it's time to put a fork in the pork. In other words, it's time to end the practice of pork barrelling—something that has long been relied upon by successive Australian governments to get into or maintain power. As Chair of the Centre for Public Integrity Anthony Whealy KC explained, in the eyes of the community, senior academics and lawyers:

The deliberate misuse of large amounts of public money for political gain is seriously corrupt. To label it as mere 'pork barrelling' is a misleading misnomer.

In this context, 'corrupt' does not mean criminally corrupt but instead means a lack of political integrity and doing something that is not in the best interest of the public but is instead in the best interest of a party by trying to buy favour in certain electorates, particularly swing seats. Often described as grey corruption, pork barrelling is not how public money is supposed to be spent. As Simon Longstaff, executive director of the Ethics Institute, put it:

… the practice of pork-barrelling … contravenes the core requirements of democracy and as such should be deemed an illicit form of conduct that corrupts the democratic process.

As identified in the Grattan Institute's 2022 report New Politics:preventing pork-barrelling, the allocation of grant money in particular seats to try to buy votes is one of the most visible forms of pork barrelling. The report found:

Grants processes often allow substantial ministerial discretion, with little transparency around decision-making, making them 'an ideal vehicle for delivering pork'.

The 2025 federal election was no exception. The Labor government allocated $650 million in taxpayer funded election commitments through a one-off round of the Major and Local Community Infrastructure Program. This program is closed and non-competitive, meaning community organisations in electorates like Mackellar cannot apply. Instead, projects have already been hand-picked and decided by the government. The majority are in Labor electorates, thus creating a system that prioritises political interest over community need.

Out of 197 local community infrastructure projects committed to during the 2025 election, totalling over $1 billion, 180 of these are in Labor Party seats. Local football clubs in the Labor electorates of Boothby and Gilmore, for example, have been promised millions in funding for projects that include upgrades to changerooms, training facilities and a new clubhouse. Yet Forrest Rugby Club in Mackellar, which needs funding to upgrade its facilities to cater for the rapid growth in female participation in rugby, cannot apply to this grant program. Similarly, surf life saving clubs in the Labor electorates of Lyons and Kingsford Smith have been promised around $5 million in funding. Meanwhile, Newport and North Narrabeen surf life saving clubs in Mackellar, which both need funding for upgrades to improve accessibility, public amenity and facilities for education and training, cannot access these funds.

The Supporting Multicultural Communities Program follows the same pattern. It even states on the website:

The Australian Government is investing up to $190.3 million over 2 years from 2025-26 to provide direct support to multicultural communities … in line with the 2025 election commitments.

This program, like the Major and Local Community Infrastructure Program, will be funded through closed non-competitive grants rounds. The first cab off the rank was the Supporting Multicultural Communities Infrastructure Program which opened on 14 November last year. This closed non-competitive grant program allocates over $109 million to more than 40 organisations all located in Labor electorates. Many of these projects are for community centres and cultural hubs. In Mackellar we have the largest Tibetan community in Australia, yet we cannot apply for funds through this program to build a much needed cultural centre for this community. Quite simply, they have to still go without. The irony is that one of the stated objectives of this program is to improve equity outcomes and social inclusion, yet this program treats multicultural communities around the country unequally.

This is pork-barrelling at its finest, directing public funds for political gain rather than merit or community need. Where is the transparency on how these decisions are made to allocate grant money to one project over another? The answer is that there is no transparency. Instead, it seems like the government of the day simply handpicks the projects where votes are needed most. Both the major parties engage in this pork-barrelling. Analysis by the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age of 19,000 federal grants allocated 11 grant programs between 2017 and 2021 under the coalition government found that coalition electorates received $1.9 billion while Labor electorates received $530 million.

We all remember the $660 million carpark rort scandal, where not a single commuter carpark site was allocated grant funding based on the need to solve congestion issues which was the stated aim of the program. Instead, each grant was handpicked by the coalition to serve its own ends at the taxpayers' expense. And who could forget the community sport infrastructure program under the coalition, better known as sports rorts, whereby the Australian National Audit Office found that the minister had disregarded departmental advice and program guidelines and that government seats had received much higher levels of funding. The minister responsible at that time, Senator Bridget McKenzie, justified it by saying: 'I make no apology for exercising ministerial discretion. To do so was my prerogative, but more importantly it was my responsibility.' The senator and I obviously have different definitions of responsibility.

Commonwealth grant funding is relied upon by small businesses, volunteer led organisations and not-for-profits around the country to support local communities. A minister's responsibility should be to all Australians, not just those in their own backyard or their party colleagues' backyards. It is the minister's responsibility to spend taxpayers' money responsibly. When ministers and government use public funds as a tool for political advantage, it undermines trust, fairness and principles of democracy, and Australians won't stand for it. The Australia Institute's research shows that four in five Australians consider it corrupt to allocate public money to projects to win votes.

Despite the government formally agreeing or agreeing with qualification to all eight recommendations of the 2023 joint committee's inquiry into Commonwealth grants administration, nothing has meaningfully changed. The new merit based processes principles still allows ministers, accountable authorities or delegates to bypass competitive merit based selection wherever they choose, leaving the door wide open to the very practices these reforms were meant to prevent.

This brings me to the bill introduced by the independent member for Indi, Dr Helen Haines, the Accountability of Grants, Investment Mandates and Use of Public Resources Amendment (End Pork Barrelling) Bill 2024. This offers a framework that puts an end to misusing taxpayers' money for political purposes. The bill requires all grants to have publicly available merit based criteria. The reality is that all communities deserve equal access to funding based on merit and need, not political affiliation. Closed non-competitive grant processes, by their very nature, lack transparency, allowing ministers to choose the pool of candidate projects as well as allowing for greater discretion in the final selection. The majority of Australians want this to change. It's time the government put an end to the practice of closed, non-competitive grant programs and instead implement transparent, open, competitive, merit based grant funding that fairly and equitably offers the same opportunities to all electorates around the country to support community needs.