Transcript - Interview - 1206 2CC Breakfast with Stephen Cenatiempo

STEPHEN CENATIEMPO: Time to talk federal politics with the Member for Eden-Monaro. She's the Minister for Regional Development, Territories, Local Government. Kristy McBain, good morning Kristy.

KRISTY MCBAIN: Good morning, Stephen.

CENATIEMPO: I want to talk about Roads to Recovery. This has been an ongoing funding source for quite some time now. We believe that Canberra might be getting a little bit of it.

MCBAIN: That's right. Roads to Recovery goes out to every local council around the country, to the ACT because there are no local councils, and to a number of other unincorporated areas in outback South Australia and outback NT to do Roads to Recovery work. That program currently sits at $500 million a year. We've increased it to a billion dollars a year, because we know roads have been copping an absolute thrashing through really heavy rains and natural disasters. The ACT will receive $70 million over five years in this fund, which is an increase of $30 million. This is really great, because I know lots of people are really keen to make sure their roads are being maintained. Across my patch, Eden-Monaro will receive $63 million over five years, which is an increase of $26 million. Money that councils and the ACT can put towards making sure we've got safer local roads to drive on.

CENATIEMPO: How is the money allocated? Is it done on a project basis?

MCBAIN: No, it's done on a formulaic basis. It's a little bit of population, and then road length for each particular area. That formula is set with the Grants Commissions of each jurisdiction.

CENATIEMPO: Okay. So, the Eden-Monaro figure is based on, there's this many people and this is how many kilometres of road we've got, and some sort of magical formula determines that $63 million is the amount.

MCBAIN: That's right, the magic pudding is worked out that way. It's not anyone within the elected body saying, “I want this much for this particular area.” It's formulaic, just like financial assistance grants across the country as well. That's the way it's worked out. There's consultation that takes place across the country to work out the formula, and then the Grants Commission deliver that.

CENATIEMPO: One of the criticisms that your side of politics had when in Opposition was that any time the Federal Government allocated any money, it was called pork-barrelling. Now, I know you're resting your hat on the Australian National Audit office saying that the design and award of funding for election commitments through the Improving Mobile Coverage Round was consistent with the Commonwealth grant rules and guidelines. Of course, they were always going to be, as the previous governments’ were, yeah.

MCABIN: As we had said from the very start, this first round of mobile phone coverage was about election commitments. When we look at what the former government did, 124 out of 125 mobile coverage projects in a normal funding round went to Coalition-held seats. There's a very different formula that's been used this time around.

CENATIEMPO: Well, let me stop you there. And the reality is that most of these mobile black spots are in rural and regional areas, right?

MCBAIN: Correct.

CENATIEMPO: Right. And they're usually held by the National Party.

MCBAIN: Incorrect.

CENATIEMPO: Well, that's not incorrect.

MCBAIN: Well, it is. Let's have a think about it. Eden-Monaro is a regional and rural area. There's been 63 declared natural disasters over the last few years. I would hardly say that we've got a metropolitan seat unworthy of black spot coverage.

CENATIEMPO: I don't think anybody's suggesting that. But the fact that Eden-Monaro does deserve the money doesn't mean that Cowper doesn't.

MCBAIN: No, but it also doesn't mean that Lingiari didn't deserve it, or Gilmore, or Bendigo, or Ballarat. There's a number of electorates where Labor holds these seats which are regional and rural, and we were getting nothing.

CENATIEMPO: You know, I just find it a bit strange that you say, and this is the argument here, is that if you promise it during an election, it's not pork barrelling, somehow. I would have thought that was the definition of pork barrelling.

MCBAIN: As the Liberal party went to the election with a number of election commitments, we went to the election with a program which was designed around dealing with mobile phone black spots in disaster prone areas. One of the reasons we did that is because the Bushfire Royal Commission made specific recommendations about improving telecommunications resilience. That's exactly what we're doing. We're making significant investments in those areas that have been hit hard by natural disasters.

CENATIEMPO: Yeah, and I'm not for a moment suggesting that they shouldn't. I just think this whole narrative around pork-barrelling and the Audit Office looking into these things on this basis is just an absolute distraction from the fact that, you know, if there's black spots, there's black spots and we need to fix them.

MCBAIN: I do agree with you there. We need to make sure black spots are fixed across the country, but when you're picking them out because it will advantage you during a normal round, as opposed to saying we're addressing a Bushfire Royal Commission with these recommendations, noting that a number of them have already been dealt with by a round that was specifically designed around a colour-coded spreadsheet, I think it is different.

CENATIEMPO: Okay, Kristy, good to talk to you. We'll catch up in a couple of weeks.

MCBAIN: Will do. Thanks, Stephen.