DOCUMENTS
Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (10:24): I move: That the Senate take note of the explanation. I'd like to take note of the appalling response by Minister McCarthy on behalf of ministers King and McBain. If you listen to Minister McCarthy, you'd think there was nothing to see here.
The Labor Party has a lot to hide when their first response is to deflect an attack. It's an old strategy—for those young students of political science upstairs. It's an old strategy.
It's an effective strategy. But, as I would remind Minister McCarthy, it wasn't me that ordered the Senate debate this topic for half an hour; it is the Australian Senate that is so appalled with this government program and the appalling process of decision-making by the Prime Minister, by Catherine King, by Minister McBain and by others around the cabinet table that it has ordered a Senate inquiry into this program.
It is not just the Liberals the National Party and the crossbench that are appalled with the government's process when it comes to handing out grants and hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayers' money to projects that went through no formal assessment and no departmental oversight before the election commitment was made. That is why we're going through the process of wanting to understand who made the decision, how it was made and how hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers' money was spent in government electorates.
Minister McCarthy likes to make a big deal about colour-coded spreadsheets—well, at least that program had colours, plural, on it. The Labor Party has only one colour on its spreadsheet and that's red. That's why the money went to Labor seats.
The money was decided by Labor ministers, and that is why the Australian Senate—crossbench and opposition together—is so concerned. I look forward to next week's Senate inquiry. Minister McCarthy, the notice of motion that the Senate passed was to Minister King and Minister McBain about the process undertaken in their own electorate offices.
What documents did they hold? What conversations had those two ministers had with the local successful 'applicants' to this grant program, where the guidelines weren't even written before the announcements were made? What conversations did Catherine King have with the Ballarat Showgrounds' new event and exhibition centre—$1.5 million; the Don Wallace Reserve upgrades, which was given $1.5 million; or Hepburn Shire's community soccer upgrades of $1.2 million.
Another program in Ballarat got half a million dollars. The Senate asked the minister what meetings she had with those proponents prior to this election commitment being made, and do you know what the Senate got back when they asked this minister? 'I was not the decision-maker.' We know that, ma'am; we were actually asking what documents you had and where those documents went in the Labor Party's internal processes.
Similarly, Minister McBain got more $26 million under this program, 18 per cent of the entire money available. What did Minister McBain say when asked about what conversations and documents she had from the local winners of her programs? Do you know what she said?
To the Senate, she said, 'I was not the decision maker,' but to ACT ABC radio, when Solly asked: 'OK, what was your role in it, Kristy McBain? Did you nominate projects that should be invited to apply? How does it happen?' Minister McBain said: 'Obviously, my job as a local member is to understand what's happening.
I work with a range of local community groups and councils, and then I put them forward as potential projects for election commitments.' She is not an innocent bystander. These were local MPs who met with these community groups, and somehow, somewhere, passed these documents on to the decision-maker—and we are yet to understand how that process worked. So, hey, we're all up for transparency.
That's why the Australian Senate has asked you to come clean. And we're sick— (Time expired)