South Australia's Premier has declined to answer directly whether his Treasurer or Sport Minister absented themselves, amid conflict-of-interest concerns, from a cabinet decision to award hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants to sporting clubs they were patrons or members of.
But Premier Peter Malinauskas insists both Treasurer Stephen Mullighan and Sport Minister Katrine Hildyard complied with their obligations under the Ministerial Code of Conduct.
The grants were part of an $84 million local sporting club upgrade program in this month's state budget which to date has funded 72 projects, 69 of them in Labor held seats.
The funding commitments were made by Labor MPs and candidates while the party was in opposition.
They were approved by cabinet less than three months after the state election without any competitive process or assessment by public servants in the Office of Recreation, Sport and Racing.
Among the 72 grants was an allocation of $750,000 to the Port Districts Hockey Club.
According to parliament's Register of Interests, Treasurer Stephen Mullighan is the club's vice-patron.
Sport Minister Katrine Hildyard's register entry lists her as a patron, vice-patron or member of five different clubs which received a combined total of more than $2 million under the scheme.
Under South Australia's Ministerial Code of Conduct, ministers must sign a form declaring their interest in any matters brought before cabinet.
The code prohibits ministers from participating in any deliberations on a matter "in respect of which a conflict of interest has validly been disclosed".
The code states that "it is the responsibility of all ministers to bring conflicts of interest to the attention of cabinet, even if the conflict arises out of an interest already recorded in the Cabinet Register".
The Cabinet Register includes information about ministers' interests already tabled in the parliamentary Register of Interests.
Neither Mr Mullighan, Ms Hildyard nor the Premier responded directly to the ABC's questions about whether conflicts had been disclosed nor if the ministers had absented themselves during deliberations on the sport grants.
But Mr Malinauskas insisted both his ministers had abided by the rules.
"The Ministerial Code of Conduct makes clear expectations of ministers. It's my expectation that they follow that and it's my advice that they absolutely have," he said.
Opposition spokesperson Vincent Tarzia said the opposition was considering referring the program to the state's ombudsman, Wayne Lines, for investigation.
"If there are ministers who hold high office at these clubs then it's absolutely outrageous and they should not be participating in these decisions," he said.
"We have no doubt that there are some serious questions that still need to be answered."
The government has denied the $84 million in sport grants amounted to pork-barrelling, pointing out that many of the spending commitments were in seats held by Liberal members prior to the election.
"If the Liberal opposition is so concerned about these projects they should identify which projects they believe the government should not deliver," a government spokesman said.
