Former resources boss Michael Roche farewelled on Tuesday
Business leaders and politicians past and present have gathered in Brisbane to farewell to a giant of the mining industry, with a former Queensland treasurer singling out one particular achievement.
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A CERTAIN IRONY
There was a certain irony yesterday in two events playing out almost simultaneously in the Brisbane CBD.
Meanwhile, just a few metres away, you had a farewell to one of the mining industry’s most prominent and passionate champions, complete with a string quartet and slide show of his life.
The late Michael Roche, who spent 11 years advocating for the industry as head of the Queensland Resources Council through 2016, would surely have chuckled at the black humour in it all.
Protesters almost certainly had no clue that several hundred industry figures, current and former politicians and other associates packed the Long Room at Customs House to remember Roche, who passed away last week at just 64 years old.
Roche, an economist whose career included 16 years of public service and nine years as head of the ASX, succumbed to a brain tumour less than three weeks after its shock diagnosis.
Speakers remembered him as a highly intelligent workaholic who cared deeply about public policy and had a knack for distilling complex arguments into just a few pithy points.
They also recalled him as just a very decent bloke, a Wests Tigers rugby league tragic who loved music and volunteered his time as chairman of disabilities services group Multicap.
Keith De Lacy, the former Queensland Treasurer who hired Roche in 1989 to serve as his chief of staff, said he arrived from down south “like a breath of fresh air’’ when Labor returned to power after spending 32 years in the political wilderness.
“We had a reputation for financial incompetence before we could even prove it,’’ he said, evoking a few laughs.
De Lacy recounted how Roche walked the halls with a bottle of red in one hand and high-fiving colleagues with the other hand on the day in 1994 when Queensland wiped out its red ink.
“Queensland net debt free. Free at last, free at last!’’ Roche sang out, channelling the great refrain made famous by Martin Luther King.
“Queensland wouldn’t be the same without him,’’ De Lacy said.
A BIG WEEK
It’s a big week for Brisbane property titan Don O’Rorke, fresh from his 22nd annual surfing trip in Indonesia.
Over two blissfully Wi-Fi-free weeks, the Consolidated Properties boss caught the waves off Sumatra with the likes of former Billabong boss Derek O’Neill, ex-Quiksilver chief Norm Innis and Lost Surfboards head Dave Tarantini.
Now that he’s back in town, O’Rorke is focused on his huge annual “end of financial year party’’ tonight at the new Fortitude Music Hall in conjunction with his good mate, Hutchies supremo Scott Hutchinson.
Up to 1500 property types and plenty of pollies are expected at the event, which coincidentally is also in its 22nd year and happens to dovetail with Consolidated’s 40th year in business.
Speaking of anniversaries, look for Hutchinson to launch a new book on the night focused on his firm’s first 100 years in operation.
Earlier in the day, O’Rorke will be among the speakers at the Brisbane & SEQ Infrastructure, Property & Investment Showcase lunch which his firm is co-sponsoring.
About 300 are expected to rock up for the event, including plenty of investors flying up from Sydney and Melbourne to see and hear what their money is doing here.
Then on Friday, O’Rorke and Hutchinson plan to host another 300 or so guests at the launch of their ambitious Yeerongpilly Green project on Brisbane’s southside.
They will unveil a new “experience centre” in one of the heritage-listed buildings, the first stage of an $850 million masterplanned community getting rolled out over 10 years on the site of the State Government’s former Animal Research Institute.
Former Queensland Resources Council CEO Michael Roche dies
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