Australia's social services minister on Friday launched an urgent investigation to determine how a UFO group received thousands of dollars in taxpayers' funds.

Christian Porter described having a "beam me up, Scotty" moment when he discovered that his department approved nearly AUD6,000 (£3,400) of grants for the Tuggerah Lakes UFO Group on the New South Wales central coast since 2013.

"I'm sure they're very nice people and there are lots of volunteers who are getting something out of it, but looking at it from my perspective, representing taxpayers, it didn't seem to pass a common sense test," Mr Porter told ABC News.

"I asked the department to hold the transmission of funds until they could give me a little more detail around what the group does."