Annastacia Palaszczuk takes aim at Labor, LNP’s handling of Brisbane 2032
Former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has cut loose at Steven Miles and David Crisafulli over the handling of Brisbane 2032, saying “the time for fighting is over”.
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Former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has cut loose live on air over the handling of the Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games by her successors.
In an interview on Channel 9’s Today Show, the former premier said the time for fighting was over – with just seven and a half years until the opening ceremony.
Ms Palaszczuk, who resigned in December 2023 after nine years in office, sensationally skewered her successor Steven Miles’ changing plans for the Games.
Mr Miles tore up Ms Palaszczuk’s plan to rebuild the Gabba, instead spruiking the Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre at Nathan as the city’s main stadium.
“When I left we had a plan. We were sticking to the plan and the tenders would have been out now for The Gabba, and the planning and construction would have been … getting into it now,” Ms Palaszczuk said.
“I’m shocked at the state of this, everything’s getting unpicked.
“I often describe it as like, if you’re knitting a sweater and someone pulls a bit of wool, it’s all going to come untangled and everyone is pulling bits of wool off this sweater.
“If I was at the IOC at the moment, I would be saying, what is going on Brisbane?
“This is not just Brisbane or Queensland games, this is an Australian games and everyone needs to pull together.”
Premier David Crisafulli launched a 100-day review of the Games infrastructure which is due to report back on March 8
Ms Palaszczuk claimed to have been told that the committee had already decided on Victoria Park as the main venue — something she was opposed to.
“It’s got no transport, it’s going to cost a lot more, more billions and billions and billions of dollars that Queenslanders don’t have at the moment because of the cost of living pressures,” she said.
“Frankly, I’m pretty annoyed about how it’s turned out. It actually makes me quite sad as well.
“Something that I was so pleased with when we secured it for Brisbane and Queensland and Australia, an inclusive games and now the athletes have been forgotten and it’s become this huge fight over stadiums for goodness sake.”
Ms Palaszczuk said she wanted Brisbane 2032 to have “such a big impact”.
“The time for fighting is over, everyone has got to sit around the table and this has got to be sorted out,” Ms Palaszczuk said.
“You know, a lot of people might not have liked my plan but people know that’s when I stood for something I stood by it, I backed it in, I stared others down and I got on with the job.
“At the moment, I’m not seeing that at all.”
Ms Palaszczuk said she was “shocked” at where it had reached.
When host Karl Stefanovic suggested she might be making a comeback, Ms Palaszczuk said, “I don’t think so”.
Ms Palaszczuk has previously insisted that a revamped Gabba stadium made “perfect sense”.
However, Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner on Thursday afternoon said it was clear over time there had not been a lot of rigour and planning in relation to the Gabba option, and that the process was politicised.
He said council had always wanted to be “team players” when it came to the 2032 Games.
“I think we demonstrated that when the original proposal was to build a new stadium at Albion, and the former Premier Anastasia Palaszczuk changed that plan without notice and without consultation to the Gabba,” he said.
“We got told, literally the afternoon before, and we got told after the media had already been told, but we wanted to be team players, and so we tried to make the best of it.”
He said council was not treated as part of the team.
“We weren’t involved in key decisions, we were excluded, and we were kept out of those decisions.”
“So we did everything possible to be team players, but it was clear from the behaviour of the government that we weren’t being treated as a member of the team, and so obviously, government made a decision on who their leader should be.
“That’s a matter of history. I’m just keen to make sure we get certainty going forward, and that there’s rigour associated with the decision making process, and I’m confident that that is happening right now.”
It comes after The Courier-Mail revealed Queensland is in a race against time to build more than $100bn of major infrastructure projects before the 2032 Games.
That’s despite the unprecedented 11-year runway handed to the city by the International Olympic Committee.
Major Contractors Association Queensland analysis found $104bn in infrastructure is scheduled over the next five years – excluding the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Finance Minister Ros Bates said Ms Palaszczuk had “skewered” her former colleague Steven Miles in an attempt to help Shannon Fentiman challenge the Labor leadership.
“Queenslanders woke up today to the fact that Anastasia Palaszczuk herself is still pulling the strings,” she said.
“(She) is conspiring now to help Shannon Fentiman to bring Steven Miles down.”
In response, Ms Fentiman described Ms Bates claims as “rubbish”.
hadow Treasurer Shannon Fentiman shot down suggestions she was colluding with Ms Palaszczuk to challenge Mr Miles’ leadership.
“That’s rubbish,” she said.
She defended Labor’s plans to upgrade QSAC, saying Mr Miles chose to prioritise cost of living relief over building a new stadium.
“Queenslanders want to know, will their household budgets be supported by this government, or will they proceed and build a new stadium,” she said.
“Do they want their government with pressures on infrastructure, road projects, transport projects, hospital projects to be prioritising a new stadium?
“We had a credible plan … It’s now up to this new government to make some tough decisions.”
Asked if Ms Palaszczuk’s comments about her former colleague were out of line, Ms Fentiman said, “that’s a matter for Annastacia”.
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