Media Release
14 January 2025

OUR PLACE – HOBART has called on Premier Jeremy Rockliff to come clean with the Tasmanian people about the costs and timing of the Macquarie Point stadium, after the Premier failed to address the many issues of cost, site and project mismanagement raised in the Gruen Report. Dr Gruen found Tasmanian taxpayers will be up for over $700 million — over double the Premier’s claim of ‘not a red cent’ more than $375 million for the stadium, at a total cost of $1.1 billion — and that the timetable for building the stadium was unrealistic and wouldn’t be met.

The Premier was quoted as saying he was flagging discussing the issue of the delayed deadline for construction of the Macquarie Point stadium with the AFL.

“Does the Premier mean he will also be asking for the insane penalty clauses of $4.5 million a year – which he secretly signed Tasmanian taxpayers up to pay to the AFL for every year a new stadium is not built – to be waived?” asked spokesperson Roland Browne.

“Because if he is going to ask for the $4.5 million to be waived, that means the contract must be renegotiated. And that means the AFL should be told at that point — assuming Premier Rockliff has the ticker and the integrity — that the whole contract must be renegotiated on a realistic basis.  The AFL must be told that Tasmania is keeping its AFL team for which it is providing the most generous state support of any sporting team in Australian sporting history, but that Tasmania will not build a new stadium until such time it can afford to, and at a site Tasmania and not the AFL chooses. And that time is not now.”

“At the same time, the Premier needs to confirm or deny persistent rumours from well-placed sources that the government now plans to ask the AFL if they can have a roofless stadium? This would be a further breach of the AFL agreement and, if we no longer need the roof, the larger point that needs to be made to the AFL is that with two existing roofless AFL stadia where AFL games are regularly played, we also don’t need a new, third stadium that we can’t afford.”