Premier made right call to travel to Switzerland during bushfires for Olypmic bid meeting
In early September, as fires raged across Queensland, our Premier made the tough call to jump on a plane and travel to Switzerland for a meeting with the International Olympic Committee. She made the right call, according to Peter Gleeson.
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AS FIRES raged across Queensland, it was with a heavy heart that Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk jumped on a plane in early September to head to Switzerland for a meeting with the International Olympic Committee.
With State Cabinet to soon determine whether Queensland proceeds with a 2032 Olympic bid, the significance of the Lausanne meeting cannot be underestimated.
And while the Premier did receive criticism for going to see the IOC instead of being on the ground for the rampant bushfires, make no mistake – she made the right call.
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If Queensland is awarded the 2032 Olympics, when the 21st century history of Queensland is written, that fateful day on September 10, 2019, will go down as one of the most significant in the state’s history.
The Premier and her entourage, which included AOC boss John Coates, Star chief John O’Neill and politicians Ted O’Brien, Milton Dick and Mark Jamieson, met with IOC heavyweights, including president Thomas Bach.
It was very much a “get to know you’’ session. Like a young couple, in the early throes of courtship, they were deciding whether it was worth going to the next level with their relationship.
The signs were excellent. Under the IOC’s new host city candidature rules, the streamlined process is very much about collaboration and delivering a cost-neutral Games.
The days of “setting and forgetting’’ are gone. The transparency around any new Games bid is a remarkable turnaround from the secretive, grandiose and at times, questionable, process that existed during the 20th century.
The Bach era is a new paradigm. The IOC clearly like the prospect of another Australian Olympic Games and they are guiding Queensland to a point where the bid may become irresistible to IOC delegates.
Australia’s reputation for putting on great sporting events is a major plus. Think Sydney Olympics. Think Rugby World Cup.
Then there is our safety record. While nobody can ever guarantee a safe Olympics in the current global terror environment, Australia has shown it has the capability to provide world class security.
We have a stable economic and political environment. Our air is clean. Should I go on?
Importantly, 85 per cent of the Olympic venues are already established in south-east Queensland.
The IOC will deliver up a cheque for $US1.7 billion. The reality is hosting the Olympics will not send the state broke, as some cynics are saying.
In fact, hosting an Olympics in 2032 will be a major economic boon for Queensland as much-needed transport infrastructure is accelerated.
Instead of new roads and very fast train routes being built in the second half of the 21st century, they will be built by 2032.
The body language between Ms Palaszczuk and Mr Bach in Switzerland was prescient.
He trusts her to deliver up the template to host an Olympics.
They share the same ideals and values. Bach understood why she had to rush back for the fires.
It’s a no-brainer that we have a red hot crack at hosting the Greatest Show on Earth.
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