Regions back bid as winner for jobs
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 show regional Queensland backs the bid.
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 was a reliable sample of regional views.
Regional businesses were also keen on the 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 flowon 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 costbenefit analysis into whether to back the bid, and comes on top of a statewide charm offensive by former Brisbane lord mayor Graham Quirk outlining the benefits to mayors across the state.
Mr Quirk said regional mayors backed the bid even though their towns were beyond the main host areas of Brisbane and the Gold and Sunshine coasts.
Premier Annastacia 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.
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 also backed the 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. “It’s getting your brand out there.”
Senator Pauline Hanson will campaign against the Olympic bid, with 52 One Nation billboards going up in regional and outer-urban Queensland showing the party’s leader declaring “2032 Brisbane Olympics. Regional Queensland Says No”.