Australia is still handing out cheques despite age of entitlement being over

The prime minister says his government “is not in the business of handing out cheques to private business” and that he “does not believe in government by chequebook”.



But actually the government does hand out quite a lot of cheques to meet promises made during election campaigns or to meet some – but not all – promises made by the previous government.



On Tuesday, the industry minister, Ian Macfarlane, announced a grant of $5m to a Geelong business, Carbon Revolution Pty Ltd – from a $24.5m bucket of money set aside by the former government in what it called a “Geelong region innovation and investment fund” (GRIIF) to help the hard-hit region after Ford announced it was closing.



There’s another $24.5m for Melbourne north, and it would appear the grants – all to private businesses – will keep on coming because at the bottom of Monday’s announcement it said “further announcements will be made shortly about other successful projects” and also that round two of the GRIIF was now open.



The government was not always clear that it would continue with the idea of helping private businesses in regions where major manufacturers closed.



When the government announced it would set up its own $60m fund, after Holden announced it was closing, Tony Abbott declared an end to “corporate welfare” and said his government would be loth to give any more handouts to private businesses.



He did not entirely rule out that some money could be granted to individual companies, but said they would “have to make a very strong case and they will have to be able to demonstrate why … there is no prospect of them getting money from normal private sector sources to fund something” because “we are not here to sort of build a field of dreams”.



But a press release announcing the fund stated that it would provide “grants to existing and new businesses that establish or expand manufacturing operations in South Australia or Victoria” and “support for existing component manufacturers in Victoria and South Australia to adjust their business output or business model to non-automotive and overseas customers, or who commence or expand export activity”.



Meanwhile, in Tasmania there is a long list of grants to private companies promised in a $100m fund – during the last election.



The grants, including $1m to Costa, a blueberry producer, and $500,000 to Tasmanian Pickled Onions, were originally promised in a package announced by the former Labor government after it reached a forestry agreement with the Tasmanian government. The Coalition promised to match it and the regional development minister, Warren Truss, recommitted to the grants after the September election.



When the assistant infrastructure minister, Jamie Briggs, announced one of the grants, to Huon Aquaculture, the government said it in no way contradicted the post-election “line in the sand” on industry welfare because it had been an election promise.



A spokesman for Briggs said the rest of the grants were now being assessed according to whether they were “value for money”.



“The funding is contingent on the project proponents providing the department with all relevant details required to complete the value for money assessment. The department is currently working with all proponents to ensure the assessments are successfully completed and the projects deliver value for money,” he said.



“The department works with project proponents throughout this assessment process to ensure that all relevant information is included in the assessment and that project proponents are provided every opportunity to demonstrate that their project represents value with public money. This is a standard process which would have been undertaken by the previous government had they been re-elected at the 2013 federal election.”

