Teflon Dan makes mighty mistake by cancelling Commonwealth Games

Wasting cash and locking Victorians up for world-record lengths of time wasn’t enough to oust him, but trashing the state’s sports reputation may be the final nail in Dan’s political coffin.

Steve Price called on the government to cancel the Commonwealth Games earlier this year.

On February 25 this year, on these pages, I urged the Victorian government to abandon the crazy idea of holding the Commonwealth Games in regional Victoria.

Almost five months later the event I labelled a second-rate regional sports competition won’t only not be held in country Victoria, they won’t be held here at all.

On Tuesday Premier Daniel Andrews tried to spin his way out of cancelling the event by invoking concerns over the cost, and emotionally invoking health and education spending.

He threw in public housing as a better use of the money and then something happened that would have surprised the “great dictator”. The world turned on him and the emperor suddenly had no clothes.

Dan Andrews this week tried to convince us that the 2026 Commonwealth Games, costed in a state budget just eight weeks ago at $2.6bn, had swelled to $7bn-plus.. Picture: James Ross

Let’s go back though to that February column. To be fair I was suggesting that Melbourne lift its eyes, dump the Commonwealth Games and steal the 2032 Olympics from Brisbane.

My reasoning back then, and I still think the argument holds water, was that Melbourne with its superior sporting facilities that already existed would be a much better fit for an Olympics than Brisbane.

Given the events of this week it’s instructive to look at the numbers from back then. Andrews this week tried to convince us that the 2026 Commonwealth Games, costed in a state budget just eight weeks ago at $2.6bn, had swelled to $7bn plus.

As the week wore on no-one believed that figure and Andrews was laughed at for trying to con everyone with a concocted fairytale.

Brisbane sold the Federal government – then led by Scott Morrison – on the economic argument that Queensland was best suited to bid for the Olympics on a $5bn infrastructure cost.

Victorian premier Daniel Andrews announces the state is pulling out of hosting the 2026 Commonwealth Games. Picture: Asanka Brendon Ratnayake

That quickly ballooned to $7bn including a $2.bn rebuild of the Gabba and $2.5bn for the Brisbane Arena for swimming events.

Canberra, under Morrison and then PM Albanese, agreed to go halves in the cost. These numbers of course will likely blow out substantially with the Olympics still nine years away.

The point I was making back then – and it’s as valid today – was why splash all that taxpayer money up against a wall when you have in Melbourne a games-ready city with the MCG as the centrepiece.

It made the regional folly for the 2026 Commonwealth Games look even more stupid. What I failed to realise at the time — dumbly — was that Andrews was up to his old political tricks.

His feel-good regional sporting events to be held in Ballarat, Geelong, Bendigo, Shepparton and Gippsland were announced in April 2022. The date matters greatly.

That year of course, just seven months later on November 26, Victorians went back to the polls and Andrews was re-elected.

That gave the great leader all the time he needed to issue media release after photo opportunity in those regional centres, spruiking the riches they were about to have showered upon them.

Commonwealth Gold was on the way thanks to Premier Dan and the locals should be grateful.

New swimming pools, renovated and expanded stadiums, upgraded roads and affordable housing built for athletes then rented to locals.

Tourism would explode, accommodation owners flooded with bookings, and towns promoted around the world for two weeks.

Chontelle Burgess 13, Amber Duffy 16, Ryan Voinescu 17, Indiana Pham 14 and Alyssa Rantino 12 have had their hopes to represent Australia broken. Picture: David Caird

Local councils lapped it up pre-election, but then discovered a lot of the money promised never eventuated.

Originally the regions thought: “what could possibly go wrong and who wouldn’t want to vote for the local Labor MP in November if the Games were on their way?”

So enticing was this electoral bribe that the Matthew Guy-led opposition, who were smashed again at the polls, endorsed the regional games concept.

If Guy and his team at the time had the guts to back what was blindingly obvious – staging the event in Melbourne, with all the facilities in place – he might have even done better at the polls.

Now it’s all come crashing down in an international and national reputational car crash.

Teflon Dan, as he is known by many, may have made a mighty big mistake this time. His financial credibility has never been high, but this has shone a light on the parlous state of the Victorian economy.

Herald Sun February 25, 2023, Steve Price column

Interest rates bills have edged over $10 million a day and heading north, and businesses have been hit with a raft of new taxes including big jumps in payroll tax and work cover.

Echoes of the collapse of the Pyramid Bank in 1990 that cost taxpayers $900 million way back then, are being talked about.

That seems cheap when you remember Andrews ripped up a billion dollars not to build a freeway and estimates of the exit penalty from the Games might be another billion.

Victoria was known as the sporting capital of Australia, some say the world. Victorians are certainly Australia’s most enthusiastic sports lovers.

Wasting money and locking people up for world record lengths of time might not have been enough to get Dan chucked out. But trashing Melbourne’s sports reputation might be the final nail in Dan’s political coffin.

Likes

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Tokyo’s Haneda airport and Sapporo’s Chitose airport making Tullamarine look third world.

Global backlash on the Dan Andrews Commonwealth Games decision.

Dislikes

Low-income earners in Victoria being forced to switch off heaters over staggering costs of energy bills.

Ridiculous debate over whether to cull or not cull dingoes that are attacking humans on Fraser Island now known as K’gari.

Super privileged Carey Grammar students wearing a woke symbol on their uniforms about 60,000 years of Indigenous occupation.

Major traffic disruptions from construction projects right across Melbourne making daily commuting a nightmare.