How the LNP bypassed key Games partners to pick its own review team

Long before the election, when he first promised no “new” stadium for the Brisbane 2032 Games, David Crisafulli assured Queenslanders they would know who the Liberal National Party would task with reviewing the venue plan before the final votes were cast.

That didn’t happen.

Instead, last Friday, Crisafulli and his month-old LNP government pushed through legislative changes to reshape an existing group to conduct a promised 100-day review, and named the seven men and women who would shape Brisbane’s future.

David Crisafulli greets his deputy Jarrod Bleijie at the LNP’s campaign launch in Ipswich, held on the last Sunday before the October election.Credit: AAP

While the LNP portrayed it as a decisive move, to focus on infrastructure and legacy stadiums, beyond the halls of power little was known publicly about the process leading up to the formation of the Games Independent Infrastructure and Co-ordination Authority.

It has since become clear the new government bypassed work already done by a selection panel involving all nine Games partners – from City Hall to Canberra – to seemingly have greater say over the outcome.

An independent authority had featured in Brisbane’s Games bid, was publicly abandoned by the Labor government, then promised by Steven Miles as he became premier last December – a model later derided by the LNP as “quasi-independent”.

Speaking to ABC Radio Brisbane on Monday, Miles defended the laws passed by his government this year to set up the authority, before a (now replaced) interim boss was appointed to help recruit seven board directors.

Miles said a recruitment company was lined up to advertise for the roles and a “merit selection process” undertaken, with seven candidates recommended and left “sitting there waiting to be appointed by the incoming government”.

According to someone with knowledge of the matter, only one of the seven, Stadiums Tasmania director Jill Davies, also made it into Crisafulli’s revamped and renamed authority.

The LNP has promoted the skills and experience of all its appointments.

Under Labor, the minister responsible (then Grace Grace) could request a list or lists of preferred or “suitable” candidates from the panel of Games partners with majority support.

Only someone put forward through such a process could be appointed by the government. Asked whether the Miles government had been at that stage, Grace told this masthead she believed “we were at that stage where we could’ve” made appointments.

But then the minister received a letter.

It was September 7 and, with the state election caretaker period approaching, Brisbane 2032 Organising Committee president Andrew Liveris and Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner – his vice president – asked Grace to hit pause.

Leaving the appointments until after the election, the pair wrote, would “allow for sufficient time to find the best possible directors, protect the process from accusations of politicising the delivery [of projects], and keep the Games out of the political cycle”.

Grace took the request to Miles and, she said, wary of putting any of the candidates in the middle of a political stoush, the Labor government obliged.

“But I don’t accept for one second that if they [the Crisafulli LNP] had an idea who the seven members were … that they could not have at least provided those names under the process and said, ‘this is who we’re thinking, what do you guys think?’,” she said.

Instead, Crisafulli read his list publicly for the first time one week ago on a News Corp stage. Alongside him was the responsible federal minister, Labor’s Anika Wells, who noted the Commonwealth had not previously heard who would take carriage of delivering the projects it would help fund on a 50:50 basis.

Should the Coalition win the upcoming federal election, Brisbane-based Wells will no longer be sport minister, and be pushed off the broader organising committee along with Labor colleague Graham Perrett.

Another on stage for Crisafulli’s announcement was Schrinner, who later confirmed through a spokesperson he had been consulted on the appointments.

Yet the committee, including Liveris, also had no prior notice of those being announced, a spokesperson confirmed.

In response to questions from this masthead, a government spokesperson said the appointments were signed-off by cabinet as allowed under the amended legislation in a process “backed by Queenslanders” at the election.

Crisafulli had previously refused to outline the process, but a powerful Cabinet colleague has since taken credit for it all.

At a Property Council Christmas lunch on Friday, Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie, who has taken responsibility for Games infrastructure, reiterated the LNP’s intent to “sort out the Olympic and Paralympic debacle of … the last 1200 days”.

“That’s why I’ve appointed a seven panel board to get the job done. And it is no secret that three of the board members come from your industry,” Bleijie told the crowd.

Seemingly referring to the questions from this masthead, Bleijie set about defending the process while revealing the extent of his involvement.

“Let me tell you exactly how the panel was chosen to get this job done and build the infrastructure of the future: the government head-hunted the best of the best to get the job done,” he said.

“So that’s how they were chosen – I researched them, I head-hunted them, I appointed them within 30 days of the new government taking office.”