More than half the recipients in a grants program overseen by ScottMorrisonMP were located in Coalition electorates and several others were based in electorates he was desperate to win. auspol | Exclusive report by CroweDM
Morrison took control of the “collaboration stream” in the MMI program and signed off on the 17 grants as prime minister at the same time he held secret authority over five portfolios including industry, although he did not use his dual position as industry minister to approve the grants., the government is likely to step up its attack on his conduct after it receives a report from Solicitor-General Stephen Donaghue on Monday into whether the unconventional moves were within the law.
The MMI program, set up in October 2020, offered $1.3 billion in grants in three streams, known as translation, collaboration and integration. Unlike other grants programs, the guidelines for the collaboration stream said: “The prime minister decides which applications are successful.”, included help for six safe Coalition seats with projects in O’Connor, Gippsland, Fairfax, Fadden, Durack and two projects in Flynn – a target seat for Labor early in the election campaign.
A $61 million commitment to cancer research and the Australian Genomic Cancer Medicine Centre, now known as Omico, was unveiled on March 17 at the Garvan Institute near the electorate of Wentworth with Liberal MP Dave Sharma, who attended the announcement. The institute is located in the safe Labor electorate of Sydney, three blocks from the border with Wentworth, the blue-ribbon seat the government fought hard to keep but ultimately lost to independent Allegra Spender.
As a result, 10 of the 17 projects in the collaboration stream were in Coalition electorates. None of the announcements quoted Labor local members.
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