âShopped around for yearsâ: Skydiving funding from bushfire grants criticised
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A NSW council twice unsuccessfully sought government funding for a regional skydiving and adventure sports facility before it was eventually awarded $11 million from a bushfire economic relief fund.
The funding for the Macleay Valley Skydiving Adventure Park was announced by the NSW Nationals in October 2020, under a fast-tracked $177 million state and federal Bushfire Local Economic Recovery Fund now at the centre of an inquiry into government grants.
Firefighters combat a blaze on the NSW Mid North Coast in November 2019.
Credit:Nick Moir
Months before the stateâs bushfires, the council released the Macleay Valley Coast Destination Plan in July 2019, which identified the adventure park as a âgame changerâ project and outlined a plan to âleverage the NSW governmentâs support for adventure sports tourismâ.
NSW Deputy Premier John Barilaro defends his Government's handling of bushfire economic recovery grants, saying areas that missed out didn't meet the criteria.
Fortescue Metals chairman and founder Andrew Forrest.
It’s shaping up as the first big rort of the year, and boy is it a whopper.
The Bushfire Local Economic Recovery Fund was supposed to be a rescue package for NSW communities ravaged by last year’s Black Summer bushfires.
Instead, it’s at the centre of a new pork-barrelling scandal, with allegations funding has been targeted to Coalition-held state seats including $10 million for a paper mill controlled by one of the Coalition’s biggest donors, Anthony Pratt.
Now another famous billionaire has been drawn into the scandal.
Mining billionaire Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest is having to justify topping up the fund with cash from his multibillion-dollar philanthropy vehicle the Minderoo Foundation.