Spence 'distracted by death threats'

Former Queensland sports minister Judy Spence says she was distracted by death threats and political events at the time an allegedly improper government grant was made.

Ms Spence on Friday fronted the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) for the second time in a week and conceded the grants process in the department had been flawed.

The CMC is investigating the alleged rorting of a sports grant by her former senior adviser, Simon Tutt, who is accused of arranging for a rugby union club he was involved with to receive $200,000 from a multi-million-dollar grant.

In the course of the hearing, evidence has emerged about Ms Spence's dealings with her staff during the awarding of grants, including "major facilities" grants to schools and sporting clubs.

On Friday, Ms Spence was questioned over her role in the awarding of grants for new tennis centres.

She said a list of potential sites had been put to her, and when they were all in eastern areas, she asked whether there wasn't a worthy location "west of the divide".

Departmental staff went away to investigate her query. Mount Isa was later added to the list and was eventually got one of the centres.

Counsel assisting the CMC, Russell Pearce, asked Ms Spence whether public servants "took your views as gospel" - in other words, whether her views affected what would otherwise be independent departmental advice.

Ms Spence said in hindsight the grants process was "not very good".

"The organisations are not really required to provide very much assessment in this first stage, before someone in the department is making ... a very important decision about whether they can go further," she said.

"This was a new process, and maybe it wasn't a very good one in hindsight."

CMC chairman Robert Needham put to Ms Spence that the process would be improved if the correspondence between the staff and the minister was in writing, and she agreed.

Ms Spence also told the inquiry that the week the $4.2 million Queensland Rugby Union (QRU) grant at the heart of the inquiry was approved had been the hardest of her political career.

At the time she was also Queensland's police and corrections minister, and was handling the fallout from sex offender Dennis Ferguson being hounded out of Carbrook, the town where he had been housed after leaving prison.

"The week was very much taken up with media, meetings with the premier, meetings with other senior people about Dennis Ferguson, the Carbrook issue ... probably one of the toughest weeks of my whole 20-year political career, dealing with the death threats, etcetera, that came my way that week," she said.

Earlier, Premier Anna Bligh again rejected opposition calls to stand Ms Spence down pending the outcome of the inquiry, saying she was not the subject of the allegations.

"There has been no suggestion from the CMC or from anybody investigating this matter that Judy Spence has done anything that would require her to stand aside," Ms Bligh told reporters.

"But if I need to take action against anybody in relation to any of these matters, whether they are a member of parliament or a public servant, I won't hesitate to do so."

The inquiry has been adjourned to December 16.