An infamous Berejiklian government grants scheme that resulted in millions of dollars flowing mostly to Coalition electorates has been described by the head of the NSW corruption watchdog as blatant, politically motivated pork-barrelling.
Independent Commission Against Corruption chief commissioner Peter Hall said the $250 million Stronger Communities fund had clearly crossed “the line”, while another legal expert said the process was an “appalling” indictment on the integrity of the NSW government.
ICAC Chief Commissioner Peter Hall hosted a special public forum on pork-barrelling on Friday.Credit:Janie Barrett
Hall said he believed there needed to be a tightening of pork-barrelling laws.
A host of legal and government experts examined the use of pork-barrelling in NSW as part of an ICAC-convened forum on Friday, and discussed whether the process – once accepted and even celebrated by state ministers – should even be considered legal, as it currently is.
The forum heard that pork-barrelling, the process of targeting specific electorates with taxpayer cash for a political outcome, had reached an “industrial scale” in recent years.
“What’s been exposed ... is pork-barrelling, and I’m quite happy to accept the pejorative definition of that, on an industrial scale,” Griffith University Professor A.J. Brown said.
“This system-wide, government-wide industrial-scale pork-barrelling is where we’ve clearly seen the evidence that we’ve gone way down a slippery slope that the public is recognising is causing enormous concern.”
The forum did not look at the specific conduct of any individuals, and the papers provided to the forum were not aimed at specific instances.
Hall referenced the findings of an NSW auditor-general’s report into the Stronger Communities grants when suggesting its sole motive was political, rather than for the benefit of the community.
“The auditor-general’s report discovered, in that case, a document which is a briefing note in the premier’s office, and that briefing note was to the effect ‘we’ve got the money out the door, and it’s hitting the political target’. You couldn’t have been clearer than that,” he said.
“So that was, you’d almost say, the sole motive, sole purpose of that exercise was political or electoral and that’s clearly on the other side of the line.”
The ICAC is preparing to conduct its own investigation into the process of pork barrelling in NSW, including “whether and how it relates to corrupt conduct”.
Constitutional law professor Anne Twomey, who wrote a paper on the matter at the ICAC’s request, said she had been appalled by the state government’s Stronger Communities Scheme.
“It was appalling on two levels. One, it was an indictment in the integrity of governmental behaviour, but secondly – I say this as a former public servant – it was appalling, just in terms of terrible public administration,” she told the hearing.
“Like many people I have been infuriated by ministers at both the state and the federal level, asserting that they have an unfettered ministerial power, and that there’s nothing illegal or corrupt about pork-barrelling. In my view both propositions are wrong.”
Twomey went on to criticise the current NSW ministerial code of conduct, which she described as “frankly useless”.
“They are deliberately written to allow as much misbehaviour as you can possibly get away with,” she said.
Twomey said, in some circumstances, pork-barrelling could already be considered corruption or even criminal corruption and would fall within the ICAC’s purview.
“Most voters, I think, are fed up with election bribes and the whiff of low-level corruption that they exude, which corrodes public trust in the system of government.”
Former premier Gladys Berejiklian and former deputy premier John Barilaro were previously open about the occurrence of forms of pork-barrelling.
Berejiklian told a parliamentary inquiry into the Stronger Communities Fund: “Governments in all positions make commitments to the community in order to curry favour. I think that’s part of the political process whether we like it or not.”
Ms Berejiklian has maintained that, while she was “consulted and advised” on the council program, ultimate responsibility lay with the Office of Local Government.
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2022-06-03 07:00:00Z
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