Labor makes ‘no apologies’ after pork-barrelling claims

The prime minister has defended an invitation-only, $560 million grant program that a report found disproportionately favoured Labor seats, including in his own electorate.

A report from the Centre for Public Integrity found Labor-held seats pocketed almost three-quarters of the $560 million allocated under the Major and Local Community Infrastructure Program.

Among the grants handed out was $6 million for the Marrickville Golf Club, which falls in Anthony Albanese’s inner-west Sydney electorate of Grayndler. It was also revealed the prime minister is an honorary member of the club.

But the prime minister said the money for the club was needed.

“It is on a flood area by the Cooks River, when it rains and there’s flooding, raw sewerage goes into the Cooks River. That’s what it’s for, for fixing that,” he told ABC TV on Wednesday.

“I make no apologies for my electorate being serviced by me as a good local member.”

Mr Albanese said the honorary membership, which has not been declared, was issued by the club 15 years ago without his knowledge.

“I don’t play golf. I’m a tennis player rather than a golf player, and like a lot of organisations in my seat, a lot of clubs, local community-based things, they say, ‘oh, we’ll give the local member honorary membership’,” he said.

“I haven’t been in there for years. I used to walk my dog along the path, as lots of people do, because it’s a community club.”

The golf club funds was among three grants given to projects in Mr Albanese’s electorate, including a women’s health centre and a domestic violence shelter.

In opposition, Labor heavily criticised the coalition government’s community sport infrastructure scheme, which party representatives said unfairly favoured coalition-held seats.

That controversy, which became known as “sports rorts”, led to then-sports minister Bridget McKenzie resigning from cabinet after she failed to disclose membership of a gun club that received funding.

Independent MP Helen Haines, whose regional Victorian electorate of Indi was among the 45 that did not have a project invited to apply for the grant, criticised the scheme.

“This was pork barrelling by design, which makes it quite different actually to sports rorts, which was pork barrelling by deception,” she told ABC TV.

“We’ve got two methods but the same outcome.”

Education Minister Jason Clare said the grants program was a way to keep election promises.

“If you’re in an election campaign and you make a promise as the local member, people expect that you’ll deliver on it. And that’s what this fund does,” he told ABC TV.

“This is probably as old as ancient Greece. Good politicians know that you don’t necessarily win elections by having a chat on the telly. You do it by having a chat on the front door of people’s homes and meeting people where they are.”