Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I present the interim report of the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee on Commonwealth, Olympic and Paralympic Games preparedness. I move:

That the Senate take note of the report.

The nation was shocked a few months ago, back in July, when the Premier of Victoria announced that he would be cancelling the proposed Victorian Commonwealth Games and potentially raised the prospect of the first Commonwealth Games not to go ahead since the Second World War. We'd already established this committee when that decision was made. It was really established to be bit of a goodwill tour, if you like. We were hoping to visit regional Victoria, of course.

This committee was also looking at the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2032. We're really about trying to maximise the benefits of these major events to communities that will be involved right across of Australia. Our focus did change a bit then, after the cancellation. We're still trying to get to the bottom of exactly what happened. I won't have time this evening to go through all of the barriers we faced as a committee. I want to thank those witnesses who came along, especially from those country towns that we visited, people from other towns who came to Bendigo and also the affected communities in Brisbane, which I'll get to.

I want to thank the members of the committee who worked hard on this report. Senator Allman-Payne has been working on these issues for a long time in Brisbane. I thank shadow ministers Ruston and McKenzie, who have responsibilities in these areas. We were also lucky enough to have the former federal minister for sport, Senator Richard Colbeck. Senators White and Sterle were also involved.

I think this is a very important report because it's time for action. The nation was shocked. No-one is blaming the federal government for this monumental stuff up. It's squarely at the feet of the Victorian government and others will hold Mr Andrews to account. I am really focused now on what we do to solve a problem. Being in government is about sometimes solving problems. Not all the problems that come across your desk are your fault. Sometimes they're completely out of your hands. Sometimes they're acts of God. But being in government, being the Prime Minister, means that ultimately the buck stops with you to help solve issues. As was often said to our committee, the problem we have is that while the Victorian government has cancelled these games, ultimately if we do not proceed with the 2026 Commonwealth Games, the world will blame Australia for that happening. It'll be our reputation and our nation that is on the hook for it.

Our committee's report, that I table today, is making a simple request of the government, and that is to get their hands dirty and try and help with solutions. Maybe there can't be a solution. Maybe it's too expensive. Maybe it's too difficult. At the moment the federal government, you'd have to say, is doing next to nothing to help. That's being generous. This committee heard that the Minister for Sport, Minister Wells, is yet to even receive a briefing about the cancellation of the Commonwealth Games from her department. There hasn't even been a written briefing and certainly not any sort of sit down: 'Let's have a bit of a roundtable discussion about what we can do; whiteboard it. What can we do to help?' Nothing like that. The department itself has only had a cursory discussion with the Commonwealth Games Australia organisation, who are the responsible organisation for running the games. They have not had a formal meeting. They seem to have had a little bit of a chat on the side of a seminar.

What is going on here in Canberra? Why isn't there more proactivity? In contrast we have the mayor of the Gold Coast, from a non-capital city town, doing more to try to help than the whole federal government. Councillor Tom Tate is a good mate of mine. He's a force of nature. But at least he's trying to do something. He's having a go. All we ask now with this report is: please, please can the federal government just have a go? Have a go, try and help support our athletes who have all been shocked and disappointed by this decision and had their future training plans for the next few years completely up-ended. They're having a big go. See if you can have a go to help fix this.

Briefly, too, I wanted to touch on the affected communities of Brisbane. Our report makes some interim recommendations for the Queensland government. I want to put on the record that the Queensland government cooperated with our inquiry. They did haven't to, of course, as a state government, but they made available their relevant agency and departmental heads. We very much appreciate their cooperation. That was in contrast to the Victorian government, which I'll just finish with briefly.

It seems to me that a better job could be done in Queensland to consult with the local communities of East Brisbane and Redlands about the impact of major infrastructure that's going into the area. In particular, at this stage, the plans are to remove the East Brisbane State School, which has a long heritage. We think that the plans to do that should be reviewed. The plans to host athletics at the Gabba were not part of our original bid. It wasn't explained very clearly to us why there was this change. We think there should be an immediate review that involves the local communities, which weren't involved in this decision, before we go too far and cannot reverse this decision. More importantly, if athletics were to stay at the Gabba, there needs to be a much better job in providing a solution for the school students and families in East Brisbane. The current proposal has the school shifted to Coorparoo. It's not fit for purpose for that community. It is two kilometres away from the existing school. A lot of these people do not have car transport because it is an inner-city suburb, so they rely on public transport or they walk or ride to school. It's going to cause upheaval for so many young students. Surely there is a solution that can be found within East Brisbane with the billions of dollars that are being spent on finding an appropriate spot for a school there if the Gabba is to be redeveloped in the current way.

Finally, I might have a longer contribution on the issues that arose with the Victorian government stonewalling in this inquiry. There are major issues around the powers of the Senate to compel the production of documents and information. We have these powers for a reason. This is an area where clearly there is a legislative interest of the Commonwealth government given our involvement with hosting major events like the Commonwealth Games. The Victorian government was within its rights not to cooperate with our inquiry. That is a well established precedent to ensure the comity between our house of parliament and state government houses of parliament. But in this instance the Victorian government sought to extend that shield, that protection, to third parties, such as Ernst & Young, legal firms, former ministers, areas that I don't think the Senate has properly considered before. It is one thing to allow state governments not to appear at inquiries; it is totally another thing for them to be able to somehow stop other individuals or organisations from giving evidence to a federal parliamentary inquiry in an area that we have a clear interest. We are seeking further advice on this. This is an interim report and more might be said about that issue down the track.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

McKENZIE (—) (): I too rise to speak to the interim report into the Commonwealth Games cancellation. The pathway to Paris for our athletes has been absolutely devastated by Daniel Andrews' callous decision to cancel the Commonwealth Games 2026 and his absolute determination to stop anyone else from picking up the slack and finding an Australian solution to a Commonwealth Games in 2026. We have an enviable reputation around the world of being a very proud, patriotic and, shall I say, victorious nation on many, many sporting fields. We have hosted Olympics, we have hosted Commonwealth Games, and just recently we have hosted the Women's FIFA World Cup to great success right across the nation.

At the start of this year, the green-and-gold runway was lined with events that would have taken us through to Olympics 2032, with our homegrown athletes in tip-top condition, fully primed to take as many medals as possible at that Olympic event and the Commonwealth Games was a key part of that pathway. But as Senator Canavan alluded to, late last year, we got knowledge that there was concern from international and domestic stakeholders about the pace of rollout of the Commonwealth Games in facilities and in consultation with regional communities. Regional councils and big capitals like Geelong, Bendigo, Ballarat and others have had no real definitive direct engagement with the state government about what the expectation was.

Experts in the field knew that if you wanted to have the transport connections to shift tens of thousands of supporters, administrators, volunteers and athletes around quickly and easily in the middle of a Commonwealth Games, you would needed to have started planning and building them now. That was not happening on transport corridors, on accommodation facilities or, indeed, on some of the key sporting facilities that needed to be up and being used in four years time. Culminate that with a federal government that comes to power and doesn't accelerate partnership with the Victorian government to get these transport infrastructure projects going but presses pause on the infrastructure projects and throws them into a 90-day infrastructure review, which is now in excess of is 30 days and still waiting. So there were lots of concerns when setting this inquiry up. On the cancellation, we went from a $2.6 billion cost in the May state Victorian budget this year to, a mere eight weeks later, the games costing $7 billion. What the inquiry has shown is that the people who put forward that original bid of $2.6 billion still stand by their figures. I don't know what has happened in the last 18 months, but something is wrong in my home state of Victoria for Daniel Andrews to stand up and be unable to substantiate why that has blown out to the tune of $7 billion. And expert after expert we heard from couldn't explain it either.

What the really powerful impact and effect of a Senate inquiry is is that it shines a torch on governments, on people and on community's issues, and on their poor behaviour. Victorians, athletes and, indeed, the global community have been devastated by this decision, and they made their devastation very, very clear on the cancellation. We heard from local communities, local sporting groups, athletes from around the country and the communities who were the biggest losers of this cancellation. And they still have no clarity from the state government on what assistance is going to be provided to them—or, indeed, what appetite there is more broadly across Australia for an Australian solution to the global embarrassment that this Labor premier has caused.

It isn't always easy to front up to Australian senators in an inquiry to answer tough questions and be accountable for your decisions. So I want to say thank you to the Queensland government for actually fronting up, and for allowing their organising committee to front up, so that we could ask genuine and sensible questions about how ready they are for the upcoming Olympic Games. But the Premier of Victoria threw an invisibility blanket—an invisibility cloak, if you like—over not only his ministers but over all his public servants and the organising committee. They're still getting paid, I might say; 90 non-executive roles are still on the payroll in Victoria but no games are being delivered. They're not allowed to talk to anybody about what they were or weren't doing and what were or weren't their directions. He also chose to throw that invisibility cloak—'Nothing to see here'—over officials and companies, like Deloitte, EY and PwC et cetera, which I know have been subject to great questioning here in the Senate. Daniel Andrews chose to silence their evidence to a Senate committee. We had the extraordinary situation where EY executives who did the original costings were claiming cabinet in confidence! Sorry; they've never been in cabinet and they're never going to be in cabinet. That ducking of public accountability and transparency with taxpayer money was, I think, a highlight of the committee.

I want to turn to the lack of consultation with communities outside Melbourne. Let's remember, when the decision to host the Victoria 2026 Commonwealth Games was made by the Premier, it was six months out from a state election. This was the state election post COVID, where he had locked everybody in their homes for a very, very long time—and we're still dealing with the mental health impacts of that at the moment, particularly on young people. The regions in particular had turned their backs on Daniel Andrews because we didn't have COVID but we were still being locked in our homes. But, six months out from the state election, he announced that the regions were going to host the Commonwealth Games. The regions were sincerely and genuinely excited about that opportunity to showcase their love of sport and everything they have to offer on the global stage. So pardon me if I'm a little cynical about the fact that the announcement came based on an EY report of a $2.6 billion cost, only to find it cancelled less than two years later and our international reputation ruined.

This mismanagement was incredibly embarrassing. I'll turn the chamber to the interim report to see the advice we got from experts on what should be done in the lead-up to hosting an international event of this size and complexity, and what shouldn't. Time and time again, we heard advice being given to the Victorian government organising committee about the cost blowouts or that maybe you should think about not holding rugby in Gippsland because there ain't no rugby fields et cetera—It's great to see a former Wallaby here in the chamber to hear this. They were given advice on how to make this more affordable, more attainable and more achievable, and they ignored the advice. In particular, the minister responsible, Minister Allan, refused that advice.

Today, with the tabling of this report, I urge the federal government and all state and territory governments to listen to the impacts that the mismanagement has had on local communities, businesses, councils, community groups, our athletes and our para-athletes in particular, who made it very clear that the Commonwealth Games was the opportunity for classification on home soil, which would have been so expensive and unattainable. It was a key, critical component to having a full para team at the Olympics in 2032, which he has absolutely stuffed.

I commend the report, and I know Senator Ruston will have more to say on this as the shadow sports minister, but I hope we can find an Australian solution. We spoke to everyone, from the Australian Olympic Committee, the Paralympic Committee, local councils to sporting organisations. We asked them, 'If a roundtable were held to actually find an Australian solution, rectify our international reputation and provide that critical classification opportunity for our para-athletes, would you be keen to show up?' To a man and a woman, they said that they would. I commend this interim report to the Senate.

Linda White (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to make a few comments on the interim report on Australia's preparedness to host the Olympic, Paralympic and Commonwealth Games and the committee process today. To begin with, I want to thank the secretariat of the rural and regional affairs and transport Senate committee. Juggling multiple, demanding inquiries takes real effort, but the Senate committee staff meet the challenge every time, so thank you.

Firstly, I want to address some of the commentary that has been made about Victoria's international reputation following the cancellation of the Commonwealth Games and the doubt that has been cast on Victoria's ability to host major events. As the committee heard, Melbourne is the only city in the world that hosts both a tennis grand slam and a Formula 1 grand prix. It hosts the Melbourne Cup and the AFL grand final and is the only city in the world that has six international standard sporting facilities on the fringe of the CBD.

As a former director of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust, I can tell you that there is no place in Australia or, indeed, the region that is more revered and sought after to host events than Victoria. Just last week, a quarter of a million people went to the AFL finals over three days. The AFL finals season is a huge event in itself. To argue that somehow Victoria's ability or reputation in pulling off large events has been irreparably damaged is to miss the point, because Victoria demonstrates that this isn't the case on a weekly basis and the culture of Victorians going to events remains unchanged.

It's also worth pointing out that the nature of hosting events like the Commonwealth Games is obviously changing. Clearly, hosting the Commonwealth Games at this point in time is difficult. We know this because, in addition to the Victorian decision, we saw the Commonwealth Games move from Durban to Birmingham in 2022 due to financial reasons and we also saw little appetite to take on the 2026 games initially. Of course, in the last month or so, we have seen Alberta step back from a future bid to host the games in Canada.

In relation to Victoria, the committee also heard about the impact that the compressed time frames for the games had on getting the planning right. There are also disruptive economic factors at play that are important and supply-side constraints that make planning and hosting more challenging than in the past. Supply-chain issues, shortages of essential building materials and a war in Europe, as well as domestic and global inflationary pressures, are all playing a part in making things more difficult, it seems, not just for Victoria but for many stakeholders involved in these events. It is important we acknowledge these pressures.

In relation to the Brisbane 2032 Olympics: with nine years to go and one of the longest lead times in recent Olympics history, it's important to highlight the evidence the committee received from the Australian Olympic Committee and the Organising Committee for the Olympic Games, which is that the International Olympic Committee is satisfied with the development, costing and progress of the Brisbane games so far. That is worth repeating: according to the International Olympic Committee in Switzerland, the Brisbane 2032 Olympic Games are on track. From that point of view, while I think there is some utility for the Senate to be examining Australia's capacity to host the games nine years out, as you would expect, consultation with the community is still ongoing and some details are yet to be finalised. That is not only normal but what you would expect for an event of this scale which is slated to take place in nine years time.

I also want to make a few observations about the development of the Gabba. That stadium in the heart of Brisbane is due to be the central focal point of the games. At the conclusion of the games, the Gabba will also function as a world-class sporting venue for Queensland. Given this dual purpose, it is not unreasonable by any stretch for the Queensland government to upgrade the stadium. My experience on the MCG Trust tells me that stadiums have a relatively short life span. It is an international infrastructural standard that is constantly improving itself, which means that you can't have the primary Olympic venue not being state of the art. What is more, you cannot use an old venue that has limited disability access, restricted change room use for women and inefficient seating capacity to host an Olympics. I also note that this plan to redevelop the Gabba fits with the IOC's New Norm approach to Olympic infrastructure, where hosts must only build new infrastructure where there is a demand for it post the Olympics to avoid the construction of any white elephants and the cost of upkeeping them.

On that New Norm and infrastructure point, I just want to draw out what I have found to be a central tension of this inquiry. On the one hand, national sporting organisations want state-of-the-art venues and infrastructure in which to train, compete and grow their sports. But, on the other hand, we have governments, as well as the International Olympic Committee and the Australian Olympic Committee, committing to the New Norm, which dictates that taxpayers shouldn't fund the construction of venues that won't have decent demand attached to them after the games. Both of these points of view are understandable, and the tension between them demands that we strike a genuine balance between them in the design, execution and planning of infrastructure for sporting events of the kind the committee is looking at.

Given that, it is a shame that the coalition senators on this inquiry have not actually engaged with the central questions. What do we build? When do we build it? For whom do we build it? On the other hand, the coalition has criticised the Queensland government for apparently misplaced infrastructure programs, which in fact develop venues that are needed in Queensland after the Olympics. They claim that the plans for venues are unwieldy and uncertain and that the support from the Commonwealth doesn't go far enough.

On the other hand, in relation to the Commonwealth Games in Victoria, the coalition go the other way. Despite the Victorian government pledging that $2 billion will be spent on the development of regional venues in consultation with councils and sports, according to the coalition rhetoric, Victorian sport infrastructure is being left behind and national sporting organisations in Australia will never recover. Critics can't have it both ways. It's difficult to claim that the Olympics in Brisbane is too showy and doesn't have enough behind it, and then in the next breath suggest that changes to the Victorian government's original plans for sporting infrastructure were too ambitious and too uncertain and therefore will be the ruin of community infrastructure and national sporting organisations in Victoria.

Of course, these things are never as clear cut as that. The fact is that regional Victoria will get legacy infrastructure under the Victorian government's withdrawal plan, and Queensland will get legacy infrastructure under the Olympic plan. National sporting organisations will get improvements and investments under both plans. It is a decent and fair balance that I think both the Queensland and Victorian governments have struck. In my view, they have found a way to balance the central tension of large-scale sporting event planning in the modern day—that is, resisting building new venues and infrastructure that turn into white elephants while still providing state-of-the-art venues and facilities for the years following.

Finally, I want to address another issue that came up in the committee process, which is the question of federal government funding for the Brisbane 2032 Olympics and infrastructure programs. There have been claims that the government is cutting Olympic infrastructure projects. This is not true. The government has guaranteed funding for 16 minor venues, plus the construction of the Brisbane area. This, of course, stands in contrast to the inaction of the previous government, who never committed to anything. In July 2021, former prime minister Scott Morrison promised to fund the Olympics fifty-fifty. Of course, as was often the case with the former government, money was promised and never delivered. In the life of the Morrison government, not a cent was allocated in a federal budget to the Brisbane Olympics. As usual, they announced billions of dollars in Olympic funding and then proceeded to never put the money in the forward estimates or appropriate a cent from Treasury to spend on the Olympic Games. What it actually took to get any money allocated to the Olympics in Brisbane was five months of a federal Labor government, a fact that the coalition find uncomfortable.

I'm looking forward to the last few hearings of this committee and the tabling of the final report. There is room for the Senate to look into these matters—however, I think the process is diminished by politicisation. If critics claim to care about sport, infrastructure and our international reputation then it is unhelpful to do nothing but wreck debates and politicise issues for political gain in a way that leaves no one materially better off   —not sports in Australia, not our reputation and not the Senate's understanding of the issues. It's a bit disappointing given that there are genuinely things to learn from this process and room to expand on the questions of how to deliver major events and get a great result in Brisbane in 2032. I know my Albanese government colleagues will do our best to answer these questions, so I look forward to the remainder of the committee process. I may be the last speaker, so I also seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee inquiry into the Commonwealth and Paralympic Games preparedness was on foot even before the devastating blow to our international sporting reputation by the decision of the Daniel Andrews Labor government in Victoria to cancel the 2026 Commonwealth Games. For some time, the opposition had genuine concerns about the federal and state governments' preparedness for these major sporting events coming up. The main reason we have been concerned is that the importance of the legacy that is left by these events cannot be understated. We want to maximise the opportunity because the opportunity is for all Australians—particularly young Australians. We want to encourage young Australians to participate in community sport and have active lives. We know that elite athletes and their performances, particularly on home turf, make such as a difference to people and young people getting out—as witnessed by the Matildas in the last little while and the huge increase in the number of young girls and boys who have now enrolled to play football.

The decision by the Victorian government was a terrible decision for major events in this country. It was a terrible decision for Australia but it was most particularly a terrible decision for young Australians, whom we want to live active and healthy lifestyles. It was also a complete disaster for our international reputation and it was another example of how Labor can't manage money. Most particularly, we have to call out the disappointment to our athletes, who we know have been working so hard to compete on home soil in 2026 and to use the games for qualifications for future major sporting events so they can continue their upward trajectory in their sporting careers. During the inquiry, we heard a really moving testimony from Ms Catherine Clark, the CEO of Paralympics Australia. I want to bring to the attention of the chamber the particular importance of the 2026 Commonwealth Games that is so fundamental to our Paralympians and para-athletes. Ms Clark said:

Classification is not well understood, and the complexity of it and the cost of it—of sending athletes overseas—is why domestic, national and international standard events are so critical. If we want to have a team that is big enough and that can compete in 2032, we cannot respond later; we must respond now.

She also said:

The inability for us to have our para-athletes in an integrated event in the Commonwealth Games is one less opportunity to have people with a disability on the national and international stage performing. You can't be what you can't see.

That is why I find it absolutely unbelievable that neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister for Sport have stood up for Australian athletes, including our amazing para-athletes, and sought to find, or work with our states and territories to find, an Australian solution to a problem that has been caused by Daniel Andrews in Victoria. In fact, the Prime Minister has probably shown how extraordinarily ignorant he is about the importance of this issue because the only thing I've ever heard him state is something like, 'It's the decision of the Victorian government'. That's absolutely shameful. This is a decision that was made by Victoria and by Daniel Andrews in Victoria that has had a huge impact on Australia, Australians and Australian athletes. This is not just something for Victoria, and the Prime Minister has just demonstrated his absolute refusal to take responsibility for this country by his refusal to accept that this is damaging to Australia's reputation.

The coalition have always understood the importance of things like the Commonwealth games. Competing on home soil has a certain importance, and creating legacy sporting infrastructure is something that is so terribly important. That's why we were proud, while in government, of being able to secure not only the 2026 Commonwealth games but the FIFA World Cup, which has just been such a huge success, the Paralympic and Olympic Games in 2032 and the 2027 Netball World Cup and Rugby World Cup. All were to be held here in Australia. The reason we sought them is because we know there is huge importance in Australian athletes competing at home and the impact that has on young Australians who want to participate and the impact it has on getting young Australians out and active, because we know that is so good for their physical and mental health. It is complete ignorance to suggest that the Australian government shouldn't have anything to do with finding a solution to the mess created by Victoria. The reality is that the Prime Minister has failed our athletes and future generations of Australians who would have been the main beneficiaries of hosting the 2026 Commonwealth Games.

Finally, I just want to put on the record again my concern at the lack of urgency there seems to be here to find a solution for 2026 games in Australia. It's clear that the federal Labor government has not engaged with Commonwealth Games Australia. We know from questioning witnesses that the Commonwealth Games Australia have not engaged with the minister. They haven't engaged with states and territories. They haven't engaged with anyone. In fact, we understood that there's only been one communication, which has been from the Gold Coast, so one local government area is the sum total of the engagement of the federal government in relation to finding an Australian solution for something that is an Australian problem. This is absolutely outstanding when you consider the incredible damage that the cancellation of the games has on Australia and particularly our relationship with our close friends in the Commonwealth.

We're calling on the federal government, the Albanese Labor government, to get its head out of the sand and take up this opportunity to deliver the Commonwealth Games on Australian soil, honouring our commitment to the Commonwealth Games and the Commonwealth by getting on with the job. You cannot abrogate responsibility for this. This is an Australian problem. You are the Australian government. Take responsibility for the role that the Australian people elected to you to do and stop trying to pretend that this is not your problem. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.