The federal government is defending its economic stimulus package against reports cash payments to taxpayers have fallen short by nearly $1 billion.

The government planned to outlay about $20 billion in direct bonus payments as a way of bolstering the local economy’s defence to the global recession.

But $800 million has not found its way into the pockets of 270,000 taxpayers who failed to meet a June 30 deadline for lodging their annual tax return, an analysis by The Australian Financial Review reveals.

Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs Minister Craig Emerson says critics of the package can’t have it both ways.

“The criticism we’ve got is that we have put too much money into this area,” he told ABC Television.

He also fended off suggestions the government was not doing enough to stall the economic slowdown as new figures show the number of companies entering external administration jumped sharply in May.

The month’s figure of 829 companies was up six per cent on May 2008.

“We are doing better than a lot of other countries,” Dr Emerson said, adding 210,000 more people would be joining the dole queue without the stimulus spending.

AAP