Prime Minister Scott Morrison

Scott Morrison uses the COVID-19 crises as cover for government corruption

Scott Morrison tried to label Labor’s Anthony Albanese with the corruption tag in Parliament on Thursday (18/6/20) and it backfired badly as The Speaker of the House pulled Morrison up and demanded a withdrawal as per the below video. It did make the news but only a small edited version and it is the full 1 minute and 45 seconds that tells the real story of Morrison not dealing with pressure and trying to bully.

Labor has had branch stacking corruption issues to deal with over the last week in Victoria and NSW but not at the federal level except for some foul-mouthed Tweets by one MP.

While on the other hand the number of corruption issues that Scott Morrison is covering-up grows by the day and includes, but is not limited to, Sports Rorts, Community Development Grants rorts, Robodebt, Water rights and the Hillsong cover-up etc. Cartoonist Alan Moir makes the point below. 

Probably the 2 biggest scandals that Morrison has used the COVED-19 crisis to cover-up are the $2.5 billion regional grants scheme fraud and the Sports Rorts scandal with new email evidence showing that the Prime Minister’s office was directing the Sports Rorts grants and not Bridgit McKenzie.

The Guardian reported on the 11th of May:

Just before we get to the new information, some quick background in case you’ve forgotten. Morrison has consistently minimised his role and the role of his office in this affair. He’s consistently said the former sports minister Bridget McKenzie was the decision-maker for the grants, and his office just passed on feedback from MPs about meritorious projects.

With that backstory in your mind, let’s get to the new information. Last Friday, the ANAO told the Senate in answers to questions on notice that Morrison’s office asked McKenzie on 26 March to seek prime ministerial “authority” for intended recipients of $100m of sports grants, and to coordinate the announcement with Coalition campaign headquarters.

Assuming the ANAO is correct in this account, this suggests Morrison and his office were hands-on in the process, not spectators. Reminding the minister she needs authority to proceed is not being a glorified inbox forwarding service, it’s establishing a chain of command.

The ANAO’s tick-tock is particularly problematic, because before the Covid-19 crisis consumed everything, on 27 February, Morrison was asked a series of questions in parliament about his role. Morrison’s answer to one of the questions in the House of Representatives was clear: “There was no authorisation provided by me as prime minister on the projects.” (Click here to read more)

Morrison has still been using the COVID-19 crisis to refuse to answer questions about Sports Rorts and other corruption. You’ll see him at press conferences belittling journalists that ask him about corruption issues.

In the last few weeks, the Community Development Grants program has been exposed as another pork-barrel slush fund for the federal coalition.

The New Daily reported in June:

I was wrong. The Community Development Grants program isn’t the Coalition’s hot $1.126 billion political rort – it’s the Coalition’s hot $2.5 billion-plus political rort.

It’s not 11 times bigger than #sportsrorts, it’s 25 times bigger and counting.

The government has a number of corrupt slush funds, but none more blatantly designed to buy votes with taxpayers’ money than the CDG scheme purpose built in 2014.

As reported last week, analysis of the government’s GrantConnect website showed Coalition seats “luckily” scored 75.5 per cent of last year’s CDG money, while Labor seats managed just 19.9 per cent.

Of the 68 federal seats Labor now holds, 22 have never received a cent in CDGs while those that did score will tend to be of particular political interest or history. (Click here to read more)

If you haven’t heard of the Community Development Grants program fraud you will as opposition Senators have gone fishing looking for information as The New Daily reported a few days ago:

The Senate passed a Greens motion on Monday ordering the Minister for Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities to table documents by Wednesday relating to the government’s $2.5 billion Community Development Grants rort.

The relevant minister, Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, has prior form in not complying with a Senate Order for Production of Documents (OPD) when shedding light on rampant pork barrelling might prove embarrassing.

Senators Larissa Waters and Janet Rice won sufficient support for a motion seeking CDG documentation.

They may have more success than Labor did last year seeking documents on the government’s rorted regional grants scheme.

The key difference is that the CDG racket was carefully crafted to avoid any embarrassing assessment of grant suitability by public servants, as happened with the regional grants and #sportsrorts. (Click here to read more)

The Community Development Grants rort is 25 times the size of the Sports Rorts scandal so at some time in the future, it will hit the government like a sledgehammer which might help explain why Scott Morrison was feeling the pressure in the above video trying to label Anthony Albanese as corrupt.

By Friday (19/6/20) the hashtag #LibSpill was trending on Twitter which is used when parties are having a leadership challenge. It was nothing more than wishful thinking as no one will challenge Morrison now but in 6 months time, it could be a different story. 

Please use the Twitter, Facebook, email and the other buttons below and help promote this post.
 

Kangaroo Court of Australia is an independent website and is reliant on donations to keep publishing. If you would like to support the continuance of this site, please click on the button below to donate via PayPal or go to the donations page for other donation options. (Click here to go to the Donations page)

Thank you for your support.

Subscribe to Kangaroo Court of Australia for free and be notified via email immediately there is a new article posted

Enter your email address below and click the subscribe button. You will also receive an email to confirm you want to follow this website. You can unsubscribe at any time.

6 replies »

  1. Pot kettle black there from Morrison, corruption and scams go hand in hand with anything he does, Tourism NZ, Tourism Australia, and even branch stacking with Labor’s assistance in removing a sitting member to gain a seat at the real deep trough,Scummo Turnbull’s right hand man even with Friedonberg funneled $444 million to a Turnbull scam the Barrier reef Foundation,the whole lot well maybe 99% of politicians you wouldn’t trust

  2. Following on from the Sports Rorts saga there has been recent criticism and concern regarding the tax-deductable ‘donations’ made to Rugby Union clubs through Rugby Xplorer. One only has to check the contacts associated with each club’s trust fund that receives the ‘donations’ and cross-check it with details of LNP donors to get the sense that something is not quite right. Even more so given the lack of transparency as to how each club is using the money (or whether they even get it). I suggest starting with those clubs that appear to be associated with the LNP. Like Brothers Rugby club in Albion and a well known Qld Law Firm with a dubious MD

  3. The corruption, lies, deceit and rorting will never end while the voting public believe politicians are wonderful, squeaky clean individuals, especially ScoMo who they believe ‘rescued’ them from a more serious Covid-19 outbreak, all they follow is the nice perfumed smell which blankets the bulls**t.

  4. Now Liberal and Labor have joined together to vote to make sure even fewer questions can be asked in the Senate. At a time when there needs to be more scrutiny, not less. And while people’s attention is rightly focused on corruption, new draconian so-called security laws and secret trials are taking place.

Leave a Reply