Australian political history is replete with claims of sports rorts and boondoggles, but is the ire misplaced? Maybe, just maybe, we need a dose of reality about what really happens with government funds.

At the federal level – from Labor’s Ros Kelly’s whiteboards to the Coalition’s Bridget Mackenzie sport fields, and now former NSW Premier Gladys Berjkelian (or in Queensland’s case, former Sports Minister Judy Spence) politicians have been maligned for favouring certain political constituencies in the allocation of project funding.

But is it right, and when is a rort, really a rort?

Since time immemorial the Country/ National Parties have favoured rural and regional communities, the Labor party the working class, and Liberals the business community. What is inherently wrong with that? It’s the essence of the political process.

In some ways, that transfers to incumbent members, and their opponents irrespective of political allegiances, an expectation that those things they promise during election campaigns are actually delivered when that contest is over.

Again nothing especially wrong with that – an apparently open and transparent process. Some constituencies and groups win, and others lose, but it’s the community that decides at the relevant poll.

A boondoggle is described as an unnecessary, wasteful or fraudulent project. In other words, a project without merit.

In truth, despite all the hyperbole, it’s hard to point to many projects that equate to painting rocks white (ie without merit). The great majority of funded projects are merit worthy; it’s more a question of their place in the pecking order.

It goes to follow, then, that an incumbent government will favour their own. Moreover, that Oppositions will rail against those decisions.

A basic test of fairness is whether a grant favours a single individual, or a company, or it’s a local council or a community based group . Who are the true beneficiaries?

As a former federal public servant who in the 1980s was responsible for regional funding programs, I can attest to the hoops that have to be jumped through to pass muster. Every project has to be accounted for and justified against programs funding guidelines.

Books are written on the project justification process. Public servants and ministerial offices are seriously worried by the oversight of the Auditor-General of their jurisdiction, and downright terrified by the relevant parliamentary expenditure review processes. For state and federal public servants it’s career shaping, if not ending, to be on the wrong side of an investigation.

In truth , it comes down to how the funding program guidelines are written. That’s where the rubber hits the road.

Governments, indeed Ministers can quite correctly influence the guidelines and criteria that apply to funding programs. Beyond that, they have to stand aside from the selection process. If they are perceived to show bias during the selection process all hell follows, just ask Ros Kelly , Bridget Mackenzie and Judy Spence.

As an aside, why do we elect governments to be voyeurs, watchdogs , or active participants? Therein lies an essential truth.

All that said, public servants should of course be beyond reproach, and there are times that they get it wrong , horribly wrong.

Ministers and MPs are not idle bystanders and sometimes need to intervene in the public interest. But as history has proved, that’s a fine line to walk.

When it’s all boiled down grant funding is an art, not some form of political witchcraft . Get the funding guidelines right to serve a public purpose and quite reasonably favour your own political constituency, and keep your own beak out of the decision, and it’s all clear sailing.

Think twice about so called rorts , one person’s boondoggle is another’s just reward.

Granted, it’s hard to do.

Greg Hallam is a former Chief Executive of the Local Government Association of Queensland.