There’s a saying in government that you should never hold an inquiry unless you know the outcome.
There’s a saying in government that you should never hold an inquiry unless you know the outcome.
This maxim could as easily be tweaked to suggest you should never commission a tax review or appoint a taskforce unless you want to hear its recommendations.
During the past week, the state government’s leaders must be wondering why on earth they sought to travel the road of independent advice. If the head of the State Tax Review, Jonathan Ilbery, slamming Labor’s record on tax wasn’t bad enough, they now face the prospect of a long-running populist battle over a new sports stadium.
Perhaps even more irritating for Premier Alan Carpenter is the fact that the man he appointed to chair the Major Stadia Taskforce two years ago, John Langoulant, has emerged of late as something of a de facto opposition force through his leadership of the WA Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The government would hate providing so much airtime to a critic.
Of course, many would argue that the taskforce has recommended exactly what the government wished for, albeit two years ago.
A major stadium, centrally located, to house the major summer and winter codes, Australian rules football and cricket, for the long-term while providing a significantly improved venue, possibly only for the medium term, for the emerging sports of rugby and soccer, seems to make sense.
Importantly, the venue would be owned and operated by an authority answerable to government, in the hope to end the possibilities of further handouts and bailouts as individual sports go through their inevitable cycles of popularity and mismanagement.
Unfortunately, passions run high in sport and what makes sense on paper, or in a committee, doesn’t necessary work for those steeped in the history of their code.
To them, at least at first glance, the fancy images contained within the volumes of the taskforce’s report are like a Leyland P76, something that ought never to leave the drawing board.
They question the time and millions of dollars that have gone into producing something that none of the sporting codes wants.
“I could have come up with this answer in two weeks,” suggests one senior sporting official.
“You have to ask how much this cost?”
However, the same official admits it will take time to digest the details of the report before fully understanding the proposal and how it will impact on his own code.
Mr Langoulant, of course, thinks differently.
Far from defending the cost of the report or the time it has taken, due in part to the wide consultation, he reckons it is a model for good government.
“This should be the process for decision-making on many other pieces of infrastructure in the state,” Mr Langoulant said.
Business people who occasionally cast their eye over the Perth Convention Exhibition Centre might agree. For an up-front cost of $100 million, which did not even give the government ownership or control, the state is already being asked to help fund the centre.
It’s a lesson in poor planning and bad governance that should not be repeated.
Yet, at this stage, that’s pretty much what each of the sports wants. They want the spoils of the boom neatly divvied up to redevelop three sports grounds, Subiaco, the WACA and Members Equity Stadium.
In a statement, a disappointed Rugby WA chairman Geoff Stooke said his sport would investigate the taskforce’s assumptions regarding the commercial viability of the sport's preferred option, the redevelopment of Members Equity Stadium into a 35,000 seat facility.
The taskforce argues this is not viable in the short-term and that investing in more than one stadium would only result in the state being asked for more funding in the future.
A common refrain is that the WA Football Commission’s stranglehold on Subiaco only came because of a bail-out in the 1980s.
Instead, Mr Langoulant believes football will benefit by about $3 million a year from the taskforce’s proposal.
A big problem, though, is the emotional aspect of the proposal.
Each of the sports will not just be giving up the heritage value of their various home grounds, they may perceive they are giving up control of their destiny.
The act of sharing, of course, cuts against the grain of almost any competitive industry, but it’s most acute in the cutthroat world of professional sports where the need to win is celebrated more than anywhere.
In challenging the taskforce, they may have a current example, that of Australia’s ports. In the current boom, the North West iron ore ports, largely operated by the individual companies that export from them, are working smoothly, whereas the common-user coal ports on the east coast are suffering from huge shipping queues due to under-investment in infrastructure.
Ultimately, bringing the codes on board is vital if the government really wants to get this stadium under way before, say, the next election.
It would hardly want to have to battle sniping from sports codes that are well versed in marketing, media and tapping into populist moods. And it needs their commitment to really make the project feasible.
But the sports may be at odds with the community view – that a big, shiny, new, sports stadium would be a good thing.
“In the end the government has to consider the broader view of what all Western Australians want,” state opposition leader Paul Omodei reportedly said in backing the proposal.
“I think most Western Australians want a new stadium.”
The promise is what could be called bi-partisan wedge politics, and it makes it harder for the state to put off yet another infrastructure decision, like the long-talked-about Swan River foreshore development or stalled Northbridge Link project.
Fresh from an hour on talkback radio the day after last week’s launch of the taskforce report, Mr Langoulant believed there was a mood for the development.
“My own feeling is the government recognises there is community demand and the community view is they can afford it, they need to get the sports on board to make sure there is no criticism along the way.
Committee for Perth deputy chair John Atkins is one independent voice that has backed the move.
“The stadium is a vital piece of community infrastructure that offers the opportunity to be a cornerstone to a sporting and entertainment precinct that is vibrant,” Mr Atkins said in a statement.
“By investing in a world-class stadium we have an opportunity to make a bold statement about the Perth of the future.”
Taskforce member and Department of Sport and Recreation director general, Ron Alexander, also believes the community want this.
“There is pressure,” Mr Alexander said.
“People go along to these facilities and they go east and see what is there. The comparison is stark.”
He said a major new stadium would complete the list of community sports assets built or redeveloped during the past few years.
Asked if this would make Perth better placed to host a Commonwealth or Olympic Games, he indicates it would.
Any such event would benefit Perth and WA, yet it places the various codes in another position of conflict. While most sports people enjoy other sports, their rivalry intensifies when they see the limelight shared, let alone the profits for playing host.
Establishing the difference between competitive rivalry and cutthroat competition can be difficult. But with all the major codes investing heavily in their development programs, it’s not hard to understand why they may not want to jump into bed with each other, let alone compromise on anything that provides an advantage to the opposition.
But, inevitably, a compromise will be what’s needed.
If so, it’s likely to be Kitchener Park that wins the day.
Next to the existing Subiaco Oval, it would mainly be viewed as a lesser relocation for AFL, which will be the primary user of the venue through its two successful clubs – the West Coast Eagles and the Fremantle Dockers.
But as Mr Langoulant, the government and each of the sporting codes fight it out over the coming months, compromise may be tough to grasp hold of in a game where the outcome just can’t be predicted yet.
Codes still to be swayed
It is with some cynicism that sports officials view the Major Stadia Taskforce’s numbers on a 60,000-seat stadium.
Perhaps it’s because the taskforce reckons the financial result is win-win, an outcome that just doesn’t work in any normal sporting code.
The sports only believe there can be winners and losers, and none of them wants to be the latter.
Right now, they are pouring over the taskforce’s recommendations, to analyse the assumptions which will, apparently, make them all better off – Australian rules to the tune of $3 million a year and rugby by $1.7 million a year.
The man behind the taskforce numbers, KPMG audit and risk advisory services partner, Peter Ball, is a Queensland-based specialist in this kind of financial modelling.
Mr Ball can’t understand the sports’ lack of enthusiasm for the financial outcome, which he believes will be significant for different reasons.
He reckons the new stadium will prove a windfall for football, allowing bigger crowds and removing the need for $600 million to fund the redevelopment of Subiaco Oval.
The latter cost all but neutralises any long-term value for the WA Football Commission in its remaining 84-year lease over Subiaco.
“That asset is really only worth something if it has a long-term economic life,” Mr Ball said.
“We don’t believe it has that.
“We don’t believe there is a claim for significant compensation to the WAFC for giving up their lease.”
And rugby wins too, even though the fee per ticket rises to 24 per cent from a current 10-12 per cent at Subiaco.
Based on rugby’s advice, Mr Ball said the sport would benefit by being able to sell 60 per cent more corporate seats.
“They could sell Subi double if they had the room,” he said.
“We give them double at no extra cost,” he said, referring to an extra 2,000 corporate seats, taking the total to 5,400.
But rugby officials simply see the rent doubling in the swap from one so-called 'clean stadium' (Subiaco Oval has no venue memberships) to another.
Mr Ball also claims Western Australian cricket will win as well, but he can’t define the benefit because the financial details are too interconnected with those of the national body when it comes to events.
Under the taskforce’s projections, it needs crowds of at least 80 per cent of the recent average to break even.
