State Government says secret survey shows regions back 2032 Olympic Games bid
The State Government says a survey shows business operators and owners from Cairns to Charleville shows regional Queensland backs the 2032 Olympics bid, with the flow-on effect expected to provide jobs, cash and facilities from the bush to the beach.
QLD News
Don't miss out on the headlines from QLD News. Followed categories will be added to My News.
A SECRET survey of Queenslanders has found support for a 2032 SEQ Olympics across the state, with regional businesses and workers saying it will bring desperately needed jobs and cash to their towns.
The State Government says the results of its undercover focus groups and interviews with business operators and owners from Cairns to Charleville shows regional Queensland backs the bid.
Crucial upgrades needed before Olympics
Catherine Freeman’s call to bring on Queensland Olympics
Tourism exposure fuelling extra jobs topped the list of benefits highlighted by the 100-person focus group sample across Cairns, Townsville, Mt Isa, Proserpine, Mackay, Charleville and Rockhampton, which the State Government said represented a reliable sample of regional views.
Regional businesses were also keen on extra work the Games would provide, expecting the benefits to reach beyond the southeast, saying they would expect to pick up supply and other contracts in the lead up to the biggest sporting event in the world.
They also expected flow-on benefits of improved facilities for visiting teams and thought the Games would get more country kids into sport.
The survey, conducted in October, helped shape the State Government’s cost-benefit analysis into whether to back the bid, and it comes on top of a statewide charm offensive by former Brisbane lord mayor Graham Quirk outlining the benefits to mayors across the state.
Former Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said regional mayors backed the bid even though their areas were beyond the main host areas of Brisbane, the Gold and Sunshine coasts.
“At a time when a lot of Queensland communities are doing it tough, mayors are open to big opportunities like this that create action and outcomes for their residents,” Mr Quirk said.
“Queensland mayors see the potential to generate benefits from lead up and preliminary events, pre-Games training, tourism and business contracts for their regions.”
Ms Palaszczuk said: “From day one and every day since I have said there would be no games that were not inclusive of Queensland. They must also provide real benefits for Queensland. Everyone has to share the pride.”
The SEQ Council of Mayors proposed a Games bid to fast-track new roads and rail with a feasibility study which gathered momentum on the back of The Courier-Mail’s Future SEQ campaign.
In June, this newspaper and sister SEQ mastheads officially backed the bid with front page editorials.
In December, Ms Palaszczuk announced Queensland was going for the 2032 Olympics and Paralympics, won over by projections showing billions of dollars extra would pour into the state economy and create another 129,000 jobs.
Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington said she backed the Games.
‘There’s no question that the regions have been ignored by Labor, but I believe the Queensland Olympics can unite this state again,” Ms Frecklington said. “Every Queenslander will win if we get the Olympic Games.”
Quicksilver managing director Tony Baker, who operates a fleet of high-profile reef tour boats, said the Sydney Olympics exposure had boosted Queensland tourism and a Brisbane Games would do the same for Cairns and Port Douglas.
“It’s a wonderful opportunity for the tourism industry and the government to try and take advantage of,” Mr Baker said. “We are in a competitive world. It’s getting your brand out there.”
Mr Baker said Queensland and Australia would benefit from the exposure for years ahead and after the Games.
Mackay mayor Greg Williamson said the Games exposure would boost all of Queensland.
“An Olympics in Brisbane in 2032 is something the whole state will benefit from,” Cr Williamson said.
“It’s up to the regions to capitalise on it.”
The Courier-Mail yesterday revealed high-profile Queensland Senator Pauline Hanson will campaign against the state’s bid for the 2032 Olympics in a move that turns the Games into a political issue ahead of October’s state election.
From mid-January, 52 One Nation billboards in regional and outer-urban Queensland will show an image of the One Nation Leader declaring, “2032 Brisbane Olympics. Regional Queensland Says No”.
Senator Hanson praised the Games as a wonderful sporting event but it was not a nation-building project and funding should go to dam schemes.
A YouGov Galaxy poll published exclusively by The Courier-Mail in August last year revealed most Queenslanders, including those outside of southeast Queensland were supportive of bidding for the Games, which also has the backing of Prime Minister Scott Morrison.
The Council of Mayors yesterday dismissed Senator Hanson’s regional anti-Games ad blitz as “self-serving political commentary (that) does nothing to support or advance the interests of Queensland.”
ATHLETES TO TOUR STATE
OLYMPIC bid bosses are working on plans for a regional Games blitz headed by high-profile athletes and business leaders to sell the statewide benefits of a Brisbane-Sunshine-Gold Coast event.
Olympic icon Dawn Fraser – who now calls Noosa home – and gold medal winner and five-time Olympian Natalie Cook are being considered for a tour of Queensland’s regional heartland that will include public meetings, events and briefings to explain why the state needs to go for gold.
Games bid planners also need to find ways to show a positive and cost-effective, legacy or Queensland won’t win hosting rights.
Australian Olympics Committee president John Coates said one legacy initiative could be the creation of Olympic Community Sport Centres – sporting facilities that will serve the community for years leading into the Games, then convert to a Games competition venue, before reverting to a multi-use community sports facility post-Games.
“To have multi-use sporting and training community facilities with an Olympic designation before and then long after the Olympic Games is an important part of this opportunity,” Mr Coates said.
“Think of the Coomera Indoor Sports Centre as a model, in the way it was used to host gymnastics for the Commonwealth Games before reverting to a mixed-sports community use afterwards.
“Queensland has a rapidly growing population which requires these facilities in any event. This initiative is precisely the kind of legacy the IOC envisages with its New Norm reforms and exactly the kind of legacy the Games can provide for our children to enjoy the many benefits of sport.”
Originally published as State Government says secret survey shows regions back 2032 Olympic Games bid
Dude, where’s my electorate? Young candidate’s awkward blunder
A budding politician fighting to oust Health Minister Shannon Fentiman from a relatively safe seat hasn’t done himself any favours after this slip up. THIS IS GEORGE ST BEAT
Supercars driver ‘lost everything’ in Gold Coast fire
Supercars driver Declan Fraser has lost all his possessions, including prized trophies, after the Gold Coast house he was living in was gutted by fire while he was in Bathurst.