The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has criticised the management of a federal grants program used to improve community safety, finding it favours government-held seats and that decisions are often made without clear and recorded justifications.
The $184 million Safer Communities Fund was established in 2016 to address crime and anti-social behaviour by providing schools or at-risk organisations with money for more security cameras or streetlights.
The ANAO found almost 60 per cent of all projects funded since 2016 have been in Coalition-held electorates, compared to 27 per cent in Labor electorates.
"Funding decisions were not appropriately informed by departmental briefings and for the majority of decisions, the basis for the decisions was not clearly recorded," the audit report said.
The audit confirmed current Defence Minister Peter Dutton approved two separate applications worth nearly $200,000 that did not meet the department's selection criteria, after visiting the applicants during an earlier by-election.
In February last year the ABC's 7.30 revealed Mr Dutton overruled his department's recommendations on grant funding when he was home affairs minister.
In April 2021, the ANAO launched its audit into the administration of the scheme.
During Senate estimates hearings on Monday, ANAO official Brian Boyd confirmed it was Mr Dutton who approved the funding during the 2018 Braddon by-election.
"The department went through an exercise after that happened of presenting options to the minister in terms of, 'Do you wish to separately carve out an arrangement for these two to receive funding without any competition or should they be invited to apply and compete with all other applicants through a competitive process'," Mr Boyd said.
"It was then through the assessment process that they didn't come up as being those assessed as the most meritorious, but they were selected for funding in any event."
The audit also highlighted a decision by an assistant minister to award $1.3 million to five applicants, despite departmental advice the projects were unsuitable for funding after a merits-based assessment.
The audit report said the decision was made after the assistant minister had visited the applicants after the funding round had closed.
In round three of funding allocations, Coalition-held seats "represented a higher proportion of approved applications – in numerical and dollar terms – than they represented as [a] proportion of the application population".
The audit report also found religious organisations received 84 per cent of funding, although some religious leaders have argued Christian and Jewish organisations are favoured.
"A number of submissions received by the ANAO from the Hindu and Tamil communities raised issues with the accessibility of the grant funding opportunity, including whether there is 'favouritism towards European religions or communities'," the report said.
The Hindu Council of Australia told the ANAO that "departments have consistently failed to give grants to the Indian, Hindu, Jain, Buddhist communities".
Multicultural Affairs Minister Alex Hawke conceded that improvements to processes could be made to ensure all religious organisations have a fair go when applying.
"I think there can be unconscious biases in departments about issues in relation to different religions," he said.
"I've spoken to my secretary about that over the years. We are constantly working to improve and train our officers in better cultural awareness about all faiths.
"How they operate, sometimes they are very different structurally compared to Western religions, and I think we can make some improvements there."
Last year, the ANAO found a $660 million fund to build 47 commuter car parks near train stations was not "merits-based".
"The distribution of projects selected reflected the geographic and political profile of those given the opportunity by the government to identify candidates for funding consideration," auditor-general Grant Hehir said.
