Exactly why are we spending $2 billion on new stadiums in Sydney?

[AFLcrap1]

Still quoting Fitzy

The desperation is laughable
His & yours

[Terry]

Good 'ol Beatup eh!!!!!!! He's thrown himself into bed with one of Australia' biggest idiots lololololoolololololol. I reckon that's a good place for both of 'em!!!!!! Arrrrrgggghhhhhhhhh lolololoolol!!!! Medic!!!!

[leeroy*NRL*]

LOL LOL

only 4% want the rebuild lol Ohh boy..

[pussycat]

Because spent wisely, the returns are greater than the outlay! Even your own kind back this up Beau.

[AFLcrap1]

Yep
Kennett said excatly that .

& strange how the fumblers were all quiet when the afl stadia were getting $$$$$$$$$ poured into them .
Now it's Other sports turn its whinge bitch whinge bitch .

Hypocrites

[NlolRL]

Yep
Kennett said excatly that .

& strange how the fumblers were all quiet when the afl stadia were getting $$$$$$$$$ poured into them .
Now it's Other sports turn its whinge bitch whinge bitch .

Hypocrites

AFL fans attend AFL in massive numbers. Melbourne attends sport in massive numbers. Spending money on stadia in Melbourne was therefore justified given sports attendance is a clear priority. Sydney on the other hand.......

[Beaussie]

Finally,we will all now get to see the business case for the stadium rebuilds. Will the numbers match the lines the Premier and likes of Alan Jones and co have been throwing out there? I mean, the Premier and co want us to believe these stadiums provide $2 billion a year already. Yep, ANZ and Allianz Stadiums provide $3 million per day for NSW.

Bullshit I say. Check out the stadium financials provided in the article. Again $2 biilon a year... 3 million per day returns??? Really???

Number crunrchers queuing for Premier's stadium figures
Peter FitzSimons

Friends, good news!

After all our ranting and raving over the insanity of knocking down three fine stadiums only to rebuild them for a lazy $2.5 billion, all with no transparency, no business plan, no nuttin', it appears that Premier Gladys Berejiklian will be answering at least some of the public's concerns.
"Once we get a detailed business case," she told the ABC's Richard Glover, "we will release it to the community."

I, for one – and I am joined by at least a dozen professional number crunchers from the community who have offered their services, including some from the DoSomething Foundation, which helped me crunch some of the following numbers – can't wait to see it. It should be a doozy, given the Premier also maintaining to Glover that both the SFS and Olympic stadium now make "a billion dollars a year [each]." Yes, as I noted in my column on Thursday, that means each stadium, right now, is putting $20 million into NSW coffers, every week, as in $3 million a day? That is FANTASTIC! I don't mean this nastily, but seriously. Does anyone else know of any other buildings in the world that make that kind of freight?

Ah, but it gets better still. For not enough that they are making that kind of money right now, the Premier has still not recanted from her previous claim that the expense of knocking them down can be reclaimed in two years, meaning, of course, that by knocking them down and re-doing them, they will be earning an extra billion dollars a year! Truly, one of the great businesses of all time.

There remains, however, one problem I can see. The latest public documentation I can find one what the Olympic Stadium paid the NSW government in taxes for the previous financial year was from 2015. It came to – $2 million. As to the SFS, last year, 232,635 people attended NRL matches there, while between them, the ARU, Super Rugby, FFA and The A-League contributed 502,788 spectators in total. So for all sport at the Sydney Football Stadium for the whole year a total of 735,423 paying punters. The latest Sydney Cricket Ground Trust Financial report has it that the average annual total revenue for the SFS is a tick over $90m, with costs ranging between $80m and $90m.

Oh, and there is this

"The Trust's operations for the financial year ended 28 February 2017, resulted in an operating surplus of $1.4 million compared to the budget which projected an operating surplus of $1.2 million."

I know. Even allowing for the odd Coldplay concert and the like, it doesn't seem to all add up, does it? But, the Premier promises the "detailed business plan," will explain it all before they go ahead, and we can all look forward to it.

And yes, yes, of course I suspect that the Premier will maintain that the benefits extend beyond just the NSW coffers, to the whole economy, but that's not good enough. Firstly, for the new stadiums to "pay for themselves," in two years, for that claim to back up, it needs to be flowing into the coffers of the NSW Government.

Secondly, the whole thing is a very familiar argument – and completely discredited around the world as taxpayers and ratepayers rise against seeing their money wasted on big promises that are never fulfilled. As a matter of fact, a visiting US academic, Professor Stephen F Ross, the Executive Director, Penn State Center for the Study of Sport in Society, wrote to me after reading my Thursday piece, saying "Your column in today's SMH was spot on, but just scratched the surface. American economists have pretty much demolished the argument that stadium construction is a prudent public investment ... A strategy based on massive construction of multiple large stadia is unwise ... Despite not knowing any of the major decision-makers, I must take respectful issue with the implication of your article that these men and women are either irrational or stupid. I would encourage you ... to dig further and to report on who stands to win and who stands to lose from these proposals. I suspect, as a rank outsider, that this will reveal a perfectly rational strategy to use taxpayer dollars to achieve some private purpose."

Well? Who does stand to win? Obviously, if they go ahead, the mob that ends up knocking the stadiums down rebuilding them will make a fortune. It will be interesting to see how tightly aligned they are with the LNP. And who else stands to win of course are the politicians who are pleasing influential people. The news site Crikey this week floated the rumour that "in return for Ayres spruiking the project, Alan Jones (who's on the board of the Sydney Cricket Ground Trust which is behind the push for the new stadium) has promised to throw his support behind Ayres to replace Gladys Berejiklian as premier." Before Christmas Minister Ayres has personally denied that to me, and I take him at his word.

But the losers, either way, are clear. That would be we the people of NSW who are putting money to nonsense, when it could and should be spent in so many more valuable ways. And if you don't believe that this is an international issue that cities the world over are struggling with, watch this complete demolition by John Oliver on all those in America who have pushed stadiums, only to be left with massive public debt.



I encourage you to play #StadiumSplurge Bingo with it, and tick off all the issues that he raises, which have a direct parallel with our situation. Watch it, get it, and then, if you haven't already, sign this petition against it, which has just cracked 180K signatories. We're going on with this.

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/the-fitz-fi ... 0vujb.html

[AFLcrap1]

All I hear is waaaa
Waaaaaa
Waaaaaa

[Beaussie]

All I hear is waaaa
Waaaaaa
Waaaaaa

Can picture the whinging and whining from you lot when ANZ Stadium doesn’t get rebuilt.

[Beaussie]

Uh oh!

Berejiklian short of stadium cash with Land and Property sale under threat

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s promise to use the $2.6 billion sale of the state’s Land and Property Information service to fund two stadium rebuilds is under threat, with the revelation she might have to borrow to build the stadiums because of her own government’s rules around capital spending.

According to the rules, the government cannot transfer money from its capital works building fund Restart NSW, which includes Land and Property Information service sale proceeds, unless the benefit-to-cost ratio for a proposed project is positive — or greater than one.

And yet when the Premier announced the $2 billion stadium builds, cabinet was told the BCR of both projects at that time was around 0.8.

The BCR refers to the calculations on whether a project’s benefit outweighs its cost. It is a measure of the value for money of any project.

This fact sets the scene for some furious working of numbers before the Premier releases the business cases for the planned knockdown and rebuilds of Allianz and ANZ stadiums soon — or it means the government will have to borrow the money to build the stadiums.

It could also pave the way for a backdown on one of the stadiums, although this seems unlikely given the ANZ rebuild and knockdown already includes agreements between Sports Minister Stuart Ayres and the National Rugby League around the staging of grand finals in Sydney. Mr Ayres has also made it clear he believes safety issues require the rebuild of Allianz.

Admitting the situation yesterday, Mr Ayres told The Australian: “The source of funding for major infrastructure projects are a matter for the NSW government. There is no do-nothing option at Allianz Stadium or ANZ. Labor has refused to acknowledge the real safety, security and compliance issues at Allianz.

“After a final investment decision is taken, a summary of the business case will be publicly released.”

Restart NSW was set up by former premier Barry O’Farrell after his election in 2011 to pay for infrastructure projects such as the metro rail lines and West Connex and other motorways.

Proceeds from major asset sales, such as the $30 billion sale of half the state’s electricity poles and wires, have been placed into the fund. The initiative is known as “asset recycling” as proceeds from the assets deemed surplus to requirements are placed in the fund and then spent on new assets, without an effect on the state’s balance sheet.

The initiative has allowed the government to achieve zero net debt.

But all of the money coming out of the fund is strictly tied to the BCR test.

Under the government’s stadiums policy, $1.25 billion has been promised for the ANZ Stadium knockdown and rebuild at Sydney Olympic Park in the west of Sydney and $705 million for the knockdown and rebuild of Allianz Stadium in the city’s east, after much lobbying from the Sydney Cricket Ground Trust, which includes on its board 2GB broadcaster Alan Jones and Mr O’Farrell.

Opposition Leader Luke Foley has used Ms Berejiklian’s stadium announcements to launch a “schools and hospitals, not stadiums” campaign.

He has also protested that with the Allianz rebuild, which he steadfastly opposes, scheduled to be first off the rank, it appears the government’s intention is to have the work well under way before the March 2019 state election, to stop him overturning the decision should Labor win.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation ... 561367e3fd

[Beaussie]

Disgusting and about time that even Government MPs speak up. Still no business case presented to the public and today news that this stadium funding is made available before the proper funding for the welfare of our most vulnerable children in the community. This Government must go at the next election.

Government MP slams $2.5b spending on new stadiums for Sydney
By Deborah Snow & Alexandra Smith27 February 2018 — 12:15am

A Liberal MP and former minister under Mike Baird has launched a scathing attack on his government’s decision to spend $2.5 billion on sporting stadiums, questioning how it could be justified when their performance in child protection has been a “disgrace”.

Matthew Mason-Cox, a former fair trading minister, said it was a damning indictment of the current system that “a couple of sporting stadia [can be prioritised] before the welfare of the most vulnerable children and families in our community”.

“It’s a no brainer as far as I’m concerned,” Mr Mason-Cox, an upper house MP, said.

“At this point in time we are still waiting to hear from the government about whether there is a business case for the stadia, we don't know whether that actually stacks up, all the evidence points to it being difficult to justify [and] the party room hasn't been informed as to where exactly things stand," he said.

Mr Mason-Cox said there was unrest within government MPs about the wisdom of the stadium decision, which would see the demolition and rebuild of both the ANZ stadium at Olympic Park and the Allianz Stadium at Moore Park.

He said the decision had not been taken to the party room.

"It was taken by Cabinet, which is unusual, and it was rammed through in relation to the government's view. Good policy requires good process and and we haven't had good process .... so far.

"The party room hasn't had time to reflect on this, we haven't seen a business case and I think the government needs to be more transparent in its decision-making."

Mr Mason-Cox's intervention marks the first public challenge by a government MP to the controversial stadium decision, reflecting growing unhappiness among some MP's about how the decision is going down in the community.

The Premier's office has referred questions to about Mr Mason-Cox's statements to the sports minister, Stuart Ayres, and the community services minister, Pru Goward.

Mr Mason- Cox’s broadside was prompted by a recent leak to the Herald of a previously unreleased draft report to state Cabinet outlining the sheer scale of unmet need in out of home care services for vulnerable children.

The report, delivered by former senior public servant David Tune in late 2016, said the number of children in out of home care [OOHC] had doubled in the previous 10 years, but that the current approach of Family and Community Services was “ineffective and unsustainable”.

Describing the current system as crisis driven, ad hoc, poorly evaluated and lacking any strategic vision, Mr Tune recommended setting up a new Family Investment Commission as an independent statutory authority, to oversee a system of personalised early intervention packages for vulnerable families.

Mr Mason-Cox says these previously secret recommendations are very close to findings of a Legislative Council committee on child protection which he was part of last year. The committee recommended an injection of new funding into early intervention services not run by the Department of Community Services [ FACS] but by a new, cross-sector body.

A spokeswoman for Ms Goward said: “In 2017-18 the FACS cluster will spend $7 billion supporting vulnerable children, young people and families and people with disability to live a better life. This is an increase of $459 million (7.1 per cent) on the 2016-17 revised budget.”

But Mr Mason-Cox said it was unacceptable that by the department’s own admission, only 30 per cent of children at risk of serious harm were being assessed face-to-face.

“Its completely extraordinary that the government would come to a point of thinking that is an acceptable outcome” he told Fairfax.

“I am disgusted that the government has not moved in the direction [ recommended by the Tune report and the upper house committee]. The Tune report has been in their hands now for the best part of two years.

"The government said they had responded already but it turns out they had not dealt with some of the key cultural and structural requirements that were suggested by the committee and which happened to be the essence of the Tune report.”

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/gov ... 4z1ug.html

[AFLcrap1]

All I hear from Bea is
Waaaaa
Waaaa
Waaaa
Waaaa
Waaaa
Waaaaa

[Terry]

https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/ ... fb54cc23b7

There's ya business case beatup!!!!!! And Mason Cox is a disgruntled party hack who was sacked from the ministry for incompetence. You really do need to do more research before you post my friend lololololol!!!!!

[leeroy*NRL*]

exactly>>

cannot believe the noise this is still creating>>

Sydney Stadiums rebuild are justified by the events they hold at current>
with new stadiums the events will go up.

this will be an asset to the government!
income streaming in.
with profits to go towards other infrastructure

[AFLcrap1]

To use terminology that southern fumbling hicks can understand .

WHO WUDA THUNK IT .

A RL hating journo rants over & over about new stadia...due to his hate of RL
A RL hating poster on here does the same ...due to his hate of RL .

Lol
I see a pattern emerging .