Growing Regions Program: Preparing your EOI

Grant guidelines have now been released for the first round of the Australian Government’s new $600 million Growing Regions Program, with expressions of interest to open on July 5 this year.

As the media release says:

The October 2022-23 Budget established new grants programs to replace the discredited programs run by the Liberals and Nationals (read BBRF) Local government entities and not-for-profit organisations will be able to apply for grants of between $500,000 and $15 million through the program, which will be open, competitive and merit-based.

The program will invest in critical regional infrastructure and community projects across regional and rural Australia through two $300 million funding rounds – with a second round to follow Round 1.

“Through this program, we are delivering on our commitment to establish a new regional grants program focused on integrity, transparency, accountability, collaboration and fairness – and I can’t wait to see the incredible benefits it will have in our regions.”

How is Growing Regions Program (GRP) different to BBRF

Every part of the Growing Regions Program is different to BBRF. The Department of Infrastructure has built a new grant program from scratch use the best available advice. This includes Section51, through our multiple submissions to the Parliamentary Inquiry into Grants.

Just three of many differences are:

GRP is a 2 stage process: Applicants must first submit an Expression of Interest at Stage 1 and if successful, applicants will be invited to submit a full application at Stage 2. Section51 advice is that if you don’t get it right with the EOI, it is a very long wait until the next opportunity.

Outcomes: Question E.5 asks to ‘Provide a summary of the expected project outcomes.’ This is a return to program logic and the way grants were written when Colin was preparing grant guidelines when Albanese was Minister for Infrastructure. Getting these 5,000 characters right will be critical to your success.

Criteria: Again, the criteria questions are completely different to BBRF. The GRP links your project to achieving program and regional outcomes. Note the word ‘extent’ in the criteria questions which enables assessors to measure each application in the assessment process.

The thinking behind the changes

Section51 provided key advice to the development of these grant guidelines though the Parliamentary Inquiry process. Plus, now the guidelines have been released it is clear the thinking is returning to how grants were run when Albanese was Minister for Infrastructure and Colin was designing grants for the Department. The thinking is for a return to fairness and equity, and this is to be achieved by having an application process and criteria questions where each application can be measured by the assessment team. This thinking and approach is across every part of the application process.

Can your BBRF6 application just be resubmitted?

Suggest that reading the media release provides the answer to that question:

After a devasting ANAO report, which showed the (BBRF) programs had been pork barreled to give money to National party seats without any fairness, without adherence to the guidelines and without proper process, the Albanese government was determined to provide something better for regional Australians.

Preparing your GRP Expression of Interest

We have a few spaces remaining to help you prepare your Growing Regional Program EOI. Contact us to discuss your project.

We will also be running some Webinar and workshops on preparing your GRP Expression of Interest. Details and dates will be posted on our website in the coming week. Come along and learn about the thinking behind the Growing Regions Program.

A couple of extra things...

Grants for urban councils
After 10 long years with not a lot for our wonderful urban councils 2 new grant programs were announced on budget night:

• The Thriving Suburbs Program is being funded with $200 million over two years from 2024-25 to provide merit-based and locally driven grants that address shortfalls in priority community infrastructure in urban and suburban communities.
  
• The $150 million urban Precincts and Partnerships Program will support transformative investment in urban Australia based on the principles of unifying urban places, growing economies and serving communities.

Following blogs will provide more details.