Analysis: Brisbane in danger of producing ‘The ‘ALDI Olympics’

Brisbane powerbrokers need to get on with the job and stop the in-fighting or risk an embarrassing Olympics, writes state political editor Hayden Johnson.

The Gabba

A little after 6.30pm on July 21, 2021 thousands of Queenslanders – from Cairns to the Gold Coast – crammed into local viewing sites to watch their premier on a live feed from Tokyo.

Fast-forward to February 2024, Annastacia Palaszczuk had won the 2032 Games and was no longer premier – and the number of enthusiastic Brisbane Olympics supporters would struggle to fill a quarter of the still-standing Gabba Stadium.

Nearly three years of politicking and self-promotion has left Brisbane’s Olympics infrastructure plans in tatters. Thanks to the diabolic mismanagement of the Gabba demolition and Ms Palaszczuk’s exclusive obsession with the Games – above the festering issues of crime, housing and health – Brisbane is now at risk of seeing the pendulum swing too far the other way and instead delivering a cut-price Games: The ALDI Olympics.

Driven by polling, populist Premier Steven Miles will struggle to justify channelling billions of dollars to an event eight years away – especially with an election eight months away.

But spending now to get Brisbane’s 2032 legacy right is as important as filling the Olympic pool with water.

This is the greatest spectacle on Earth and will be the single-most significant event in Queensland’s history and we must ensure the effort to reduce costs doesn’t come at the expense of transformational projects.

Critical transport and precinct upgrades needed to facilitate the region’s booming population – the foundational reason Brisbane campaigned for the Games in 2015 – are now caught up in bureaucracy and layers of partisan politics.

The huge benefits of the Games have been muddied as the controversial Gabba knockdown becomes the lightning rod for energised opponents of the Olympics.

That blame lies squarely at former premier Ms Palaszczuk and the arrogant ‘don’t you worry about that’ culture that permeated through her office.

Remember, the cost of the Gabba rebuild never increased from $1bn to $2.7bn.

That original $1bn cost, as the Auditor-General found, was made up for a press release with no business case ever completed.

John Coates and Andrew Liveris are right to assure the show will open – but it’s the quality of show and what happens when it closes that should most concern Queenslanders.