Skewed: How grants with ministerial discretion are biased towards Coalition seats

featuring Ebony Bennett, Bill Browne and Hannah Melville-Rea

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Grants with ministerial discretion skew towards Coalition seats

This week the Australia Institute released the biggest most comprehensive analysis of federal government grants programs ever undertaken, which revealed that $3.9 billion spent by federal grants programs with ministerial discretion has clearly skewed towards marginal Coalition seats in particular, at the expense of safe Labor seats and, to a lesser extent, safe Coalition seats. It’s public money, but there is little transparency about how it is spent or who gets the money.
Recorded live on 30 November 2021, things may have changed since recording.
The Australia Institute // @theausinstitute
Host: Ebony Bennett, Deputy Director, Australia Institute // @ebony_bennett
Guests:
Bill Browne, senior researcher, Democracy & Accountablity program // @Browne90
Hannah Melville-Rea, Anne Kantor Fellow // @HannahMelRea
Producer: Jennifer Macey // @jennifermacey
Theme Music: Pulse and Thrum; additional music by Blue Dot Sessions

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