Mr BAYLEY (Clark) – Honourable Speaker, I will speak to the substantive motion as well as the amendment, if that’s okay. The Greens will support the motion. We are in the interests of transparency and I thank the member for Clark for tabling this motion. We thought it was a good initiative because the costs of this stadium have been opaque since day one, and the more transparency possible the better.
When it comes to the amendment, we are taking a lead from the mover of the motion. We are happy to support the amendment as well. However, we note the Leader of Government Business’s comments that this guts the motion. It only guts it if you don’t honour the spirit of the motion and the spirit of the House’s request of you. It is really on you if you believe that this guts the motion and it demonstrates that you don’t actually have an intention to deliver on it.
Mr Abetz – No, the timeline.
Mr Willie – He was worried about the 30 days, I think.
Mr Abetz – It was the timeline.
Mr BAYLEY – Okay, thanks for the clarification. To take a step back, while this is an industrial wasteland, as the Leader has said, has been described as a blot and even the Premier, in one of his answers this week, described it as a wasteland or an industrial site, this is an important brownfield site. This is probably one of the most significant brownfield sites on the waterfront, or virtual waterfront, in the country. It’s not going to stay an industrial wasteland. In fact, the government spent millions of dollars and almost a decade working up the Mac Point Precinct Plan, which included housing. It included the escarpment, the precinct, the gateway, the promenade, the Goods Shed, the underground. Importantly, there was also a Truth and Reconciliation Park, which was a profound hook by the community and the government that was supported by many, a Truth and Reconciliation Park that linked the city to the Cenotaph. The government junked that development plan in exchange for the stadium. In doing so, they had to pay out a developer $1.6 million not to develop there. It was contracted to build at the escarpment and that was junked.
At the time that the development master plan was released, both the Premier and the then minister for State Development, Construction and Housing, Mr Barnett, said:
The Macquarie Point development provides a significant one time only opportunity for Hobart and Tasmania. The development is estimated to be worth $1 billion and will support almost 10,000 jobs during construction alone.
Yes, this is a wasteland now, but it was never intended to stay a wasteland. We need to remember that because this is a really important opportunity.
The AFL deal was a dud deal, whether it’s because the Treasury didn’t get to look at it, the Cabinet didn’t get to look at it, because we, as the taxpayer, are on the hook for every single cost blowout or because of the penalties. It has been criticised by numerous people, including the independent economist commissioned by this government to look into the stadium, who said:
The AFL has a legitimate interest in insisting that should it enter the competition, a Tasmanian team is viable and competitive, and not an undue burden on other teams. However, the AFL’s agreement with the Tasmanian government goes well beyond this. It contains terms that are of marginal significance for the AFL, but which impose substantial costs on all Tasmanians. These include the site on which the stadium is located, the speed with which the stadium is completed and whether or not it has a roof.
The AFL has imposed these on Tasmania ahead of any credible planning process. Here we are, both major parties utterly committed to this project and clearly going to pass the order when it comes to this parliament, come what may, no matter what the Tasmanian Planning Commission says. The AFL made those commitments. I’ve heard the argument here in relation to setting up the team for success and financial success. However, the Devils themselves say that the Macquarie Point Stadium is worth $5.4 to $5.9 million a year. That’s a lot of money for me if it was coming out of my budget, but the Macquarie Point Stadium delivers less than $6 million a year. The Devils, in their submission to the TPC, say:
However, by way of illustration and comparison, were the Macquarie Point Stadium not an option, and instead the Tasmanian Football Club was required to play at the existing stadium at Ninja –
Bellerive –
… the club would be approximately $5.4 to $5.9 million worse off per year.
We’re talking peanuts in the whole scheme of things, whether that’s sponsorship, corporate hospitality, membership, match receipts, merchandise or intangible impacts. That is what this debate is over.
We’ve had numerous commitments along the way, commitment after commitment made and broken. We’ve had the ‘$375 million and not one red cent more’; we’ve had this promise of the mythical public-private partnerships then that was taken off the table and it was then acknowledged that borrowings to Macquarie Point was going to be the way the stadium was going to be funded. It’s now acknowledged that $715 million is $945 million and that is just the start of it. It doesn’t include the interest on those borrowings, it doesn’t include a whole range of peripheral enabling infrastructure elements of the project and it doesn’t include the cost of some of these conditions. The Pre-Election Financial Outlook (PEFO) identified the risks associated with the stadium. It says:
The actual cost of construction of the stadium will not be known until the project is put to tender.
That’s, effectively, a point that you made, but he did say a range of issues could further impact on the cost of the stadium, including a tight construction market – including Brisbane, of course – the bespoke nature of the roof, and the cost of related projects to support the stadium, not included in the $945 million. These costs were not included in the 2024-25 Revised Estimates Report and represent unfunded budget risks.
Treasury itself, when it is has the independence of writing a PIFO, has identified the risks and those risks are real. There is a real risk to our credit rating as well. The Tasmanian Planning Commission has identified that there’s an almost $2 billion debt liability over 10 years and that’s going to cost hundreds of millions of dollars to service.
Obviously, the Planning Commission has also identified other issues associated with the project, the Cenotaph, Aboriginal heritage issues, transport and movement issues, stormwater and evacuation issues, but of course we wait for the Tasmanian Planning Commission report to be issued next week. We look forward to that. Irrespective of whether it recommends an approval or a refusal, it is clear that the Premier is going to bring in an order to pass the part to approve the development.
We can argue whether the conditions will be a cost or may be a cost, but the reality is, there are 17 pages of permit conditions that the government developed and attached to this enabling legislation to table in this place. Looking through that, it’s pretty simple to see that they are going to be clear. It’s really important, there’s a whole lot of them, including transport management planning, landscape planning, traffic access and upgraded footpaths. This is an issue. When we were briefed by the Hobart City Council around the time that the Planning Commission was taking submissions, the council shared its submission. One of the things that the Hobart City Council shared with us – it’s deeply opposed to this project, despite the assessed economic impacts and benefits for Tasmania – they are really worried about things like the uplift of pedestrian infrastructure around the stadium.
Mr Willie – What about all the economic activity?
Mr BAYLEY – They don’t know who’s going to have to pay for that. They haven’t been told whether they’re going to be paying for it. They haven’t been told whether the government’s going to pay for it. At the moment, this is an unfunded, unassessed issue that we need to get a handle on. It’s incumbent upon us before we vote to have the full costs before us. You can argue as to whether this has a motive of stopping the stadium or otherwise, but I accept at face value that this is in the interest of transparency. This is in the interests of making sure that we have all the information before us.
This is a big issue, the majority of Tasmanians oppose this stadium, that has been clear in poll after poll. The majority of Tasmanians know that other services, whether health or housing, are underfunded and you can argue how much of a drop in the ocean $2 billion over 10 years is, but it’s a hell of a lot of houses and it’s a hell of a lot of help for vulnerable Tasmanians. We think it’s imperative that we get this information before we have to vote on this order.
