Build venues on time, on budget

Because the Palaszczuk and Miles Labor governments frittered away more than three years from the time Brisbane was named as host for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Queensland Premier David Crisafulli had no ideal option for where the main stadium and facilities for key events such as swimming should be located. After those decisions are announced on Tuesday, the LNP government has two imperatives: to complete the venues on time and on budget. Doing so will be a significant test for Mr Crisafulli, who was elected vowing to improve infrastructure and service delivery.

If he succeeds, breaking his election promise about “no new stadium” for the Games is likely to be forgiven – assuming a new stadium is to be built at Victoria Park on Brisbane’s inner northside. Developing the facilities and necessary transport links will be a challenge under tightening time pressures. Likewise upgrading rail and road links between Brisbane and the Gold and Sunshine coasts by which tens of thousands of people a day will travel to and from Brisbane. That so little has been done after so long must set alarm bells ringing.

It leaves no room for inefficiency and price gouging by militant unions such as the CFMEU, which was placed into administration in August 2024 for up to five years by federal Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus. The Crisafulli government’s restoration of the Queensland Productivity Commission in March should help. Its first task will be to review the state’s building and construction industry. That is essential after the industry found in 2024 that a deal between ­unions and the state Labor government had driven construction costs up 20 per cent.

The Miles government’s Best Practice Industry Conditions – dubbed the “CFMEU tax” – forced contractors tendering for major government-funded projects to negotiate agreements with unions and set conditions such as double pay when it rained, 5 per cent pay rises a year until 2027 and 300 per cent loading for working on and between Christmas Day and New Year’s Day or Good Friday and Easter Monday. It has been abolished by the LNP. Work on Brisbane’s Cross River Rail project, a new 10km train line under the Brisbane River and CBD, was halted in April 2024 when the CFMEU demanded pay rises that would have resulted in entry-level workers earning up to $240,000 a year. Union pressures also delayed and increased the cost of the Queen’s Wharf development.

The locations announced when Mr Crisafulli reveals the result of the 100-day review into Games venues and planning by the Games Independent Infrastructure and Co-ordination Authority will not please everybody. If, as anticipated, the main stadium is to be built at Victoria Park, those who preferred the original plan for the Gabba cricket ground – which has brilliant transport links – to be rebuilt as the main stadium will be disappointed. But former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s $1bn guesstimate of the cost of the Gabba rebuild, which became $2.7bn, was never going to suffice. The time for argument is over. Getting the infrastructure ready, paying for it and minimising disruption during preparations are what matter.