SYDNEY (AFP) — The Australian government was Friday accused of handing out millions of dollars worth of political perks, as a new opinion poll showed Prime Minister John Howard faces defeat in next week's election.
An independent auditor found that Howard's government made a flurry of financial grants to key electorates ahead of the last election in 2004, including many allocated without explanation or over objections from bureaucrats.
The opposition Labor Party, buoyed by a new opinion poll showing it could score a convincing victory in a national election on November 24, seized on the report, saying it exposed systemic corruption.
The national audit office report found the government used a 410-million-dollar (366 million US) programme for rural areas to funnel millions of dollars to seats either held by the government or considered winnable in the 2004 election.
Electorates safely held by Labor missed out as projects were rushed through just before the 2004 vote, it said.
In one case, a minister signed off on a range of projects worth a total of 3.35 million dollars in a 51-minute spending spree that ended just an hour before the government called the election and went into caretaker mode.
The report's release created a political headache for Howard's conservative government, which opinion polls show is well behind a resurgent Labor Party led by Kevin Rudd as campaigning enters its final phase.
Labor said the report proved the government corruptly used taxpayers' money to shore up political support.
"The prime minister today has to explain how he's allowed his ministers to undertake systematic corruption of this scheme over the past three years," Labor spokesman Simon Crean said.
"They hoped they could bury it, they hoped that they could contain it beyond the election, they know that they've been caught out."
Rudd urged Howard to respond to the report.
"My call to Mr Howard is to accept responsibility for this waste of taxpayers' money in short-term political fixes rather than the long-term investment plan for the nation," he said.
Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile defended the grants, saying it should come as no surprise that government seats were given the most money as most rural electorates were held by the ruling coalition.
But the scandal is unwelcome for the government, which opinion surveys show has failed to close in on Labor in almost a year of unofficial campaigning.
The latest Nielsen poll, published in The Sydney Morning Herald, has Rudd leading Howard's conservative Liberal/National coalition 54 percent to 46 percent.
The survey of 1,465 voters found that while Howard has made gains since announcing the election almost five weeks ago, these will not be enough to stop 50-year-old Rudd becoming the country's next prime minister.
Howard, who has won the past four elections, has gained two percentage points as preferred leader to 43 percent over the past two weeks while former diplomat Rudd was unchanged on 49 percent.
Howard won the October 2004 election with an increased majority and Rudd must take at least 16 seats from the coalition at next week's poll to form a government.
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