Deputy Premier John Barilaro has denied the Wagga electorate received a disproportionate share of bushfire grants and claimed there is an "incorrect" campaign to link the money to Riverina's federal MP. Mr Barilaro on Monday told a parliamentary inquiry into the NSW grants system that Wagga was one of the "non-government seats" that shared in $50 million of the $177 million first round of funding after the Black Summer bushfires. "The one that benefited the most was the seat of Wagga Wagga and there has been [allegations] that I helped out my good friend Michael McCormack, federally, in relation to the seat of Wagga Wagga," he said. "But the seat of Riverina, which is Michael's seat, actually holds the local government area of Wagga Wagga ... which got zero dollars. "The state seat of Wagga, which is independent, received $48 million and the balance of that was in the federal seat of Eden-Monaro, which is the Labor [MP] Kristy McBain." Greens MLC and inquiry chairman David Shoebridge has previously claimed that the grants were "overwhelmingly allocated towards Coalition seats ... based on politics rather than the need to recover from the fires". Mr Shoebridge told the hearing that the Snowy Valleys council area was "showered with money" by Mr Barilaro despite having "almost the same" level of bushfire damage to the economy as areas that received no grants. Mr Barilaro said the first round of grants prioritised "shovel-ready projects that could be started in six months" and was aimed at supporting industries such as timber and horticulture. "Those areas like Batlow and Tumut were devastated, industries destroyed, big employers like Visy in the forestry game were all impacted," he said. Mr Barilaro denied he had spoken about a $10 million grant with Visy executive chairman Anthony Pratt, who donated $1.5 million to the federal coalition in 2018/19, and said the money was aimed at salvaging burnt logs and supporting 1200 jobs in the region. Wagga MP Joe McGirr has also hit out at "misinformation" claiming that bushfire recovery money was spent within Wagga City Council boundaries. "This is a really important issue for the people of the Snowy Valleys ... half of that council was burnt out and, as I said at the time and I keep saying, the damage done to that region is long term," he said. "It affected horticulture, which will take ten years to recover, and it affects forestry, which will take 20 to 30 years to recover. "On the basis of that the Snowy Valleys is possibly the worst affected area in the state, so the funding that was provided was quite appropriate to address that."
