MELISSA PARKE is demanding answers over a crime prevention fund that has awarded 90 per cent of grants to Coalition-held seats.

The federal Fremantle MP says there is “legitimate cause to examine a program that is clearly skewed to Coalition electorates”.

The federal auditor-general thinks so too: he’s launched an investigation into the $50 million “Safer Streets” program, overseen by federal justice minister and WA Liberal MP Michael Keenan.

Mr Keenan’s seat of Stirling has been awarded $550,000 by the fund—one of the biggest amounts to any electorate in the country.

To date, the fund has allocated $20m to 34 electorates, 30 of them held by Coalition MPs. Freo got zip.

Mr Keenan is refusing to release information about how the funding is approved.

“It’s disappointing that Michael Keenan, the responsible minister, is opposing the release of further information, especially when his own electorate was a huge beneficiary of the program in question,” says Ms Parke.

“All government programs need to be based on proper process, not political interests or patronage.”

Labor MP Alannah MacTiernan says Safer Streets should be renamed Safer Seats: “We’ve got some good old-fashioned pork going on here,” she says.

“The lack of subtlety is so great that it continues the story of Liberal arrogance: they did so little to make this look evenly remotely plausible.

“In WA, it’s 73.4 per cent of funding that’s gone to Coalition seats, so we weren’t quite as bad.”

She applauds $298,034 allocated for Maylands and Morley in her seat, but notes Bayswater mayor Sylvan Albert was a former Liberal candidate.

Mr Keenan’s spokesperson Emily Broadbent says applications must meet Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 funding guidelines.

“In the lead up to the 2010 election the Coalition government committed to making communities safer, and we’re delivering on those commitments.”

Under Labor, Safer Streets was known as the National Crime Prevention Fund.

by STEPHEN POLLOCK