Public funding for dam projects with no business case is private sector subsidy, report says

Productivity Commission says Australian governments have allocated funding to several projects failing cost-benefit analyses

The Productivity Commission has slammed decisions by the federal and state governments to fund major dam projects without business cases, saying that several fail cost-benefit analyses and amount to subsidies for the private sector.

In a new draft report on national water policy, the commission has singled out Rookwood weir on the Fitzroy river in Queensland and the Dungowan dam on the Peel near Tamworth to demonstrate its concerns about the way decisions are made about infrastructure.