2026 COMMONWEALTH GAMES CANCELLED

[Cliff Austen]

2026 VICTORIAN COMMONWEALTH GAMES CANCELLED

Shooting Australia is shocked and bitterly disappointed with today's announcement from Premier, Daniel Andrews, that Victoria will no longer host the 2026 Commonwealth Games due to concerns about funding.

Adam Sachs, Chief Executive Officer of Shooting Australia says, "An enormous contribution of time and effort went into Shootings' bid to have our sport reinstated into the Commonwealth Games program. It is extremely unfortunate that this opportunity will now no longer be available to our athletes and our sport. Despite today's news, I want to take the opportunity again, to thank Shooting Australia's Member Organisations and the wider target shooting community for their support and contribution over the previous 18 months. Our sport will continue to benefit from this type of collaboration moving forward as we work towards the opportunities ahead of us.

Today's announcement does not diminish the focus and support that Shooting Australia is bringing to the preparation of our athletes leading into the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, and then onto Los Angeles in 2028 and a home Games in Brisbane in 2032."

[Weairy]

To be fair, $7 Billion for a 12 day sporting event is obscene

[Lithgow]

To be fair, $7 Billion for a 12 day sporting event is obscene

Whilst that big a number may be hard for you to fathom, the revenue raised, new facilities and facility upgrades would greatly benefit future generations of sport, not just shooting.

[Weairy]

To be fair, $7 Billion for a 12 day sporting event is obscene

Whilst that big a number may be hard for you to fathom, the revenue raised, new facilities and facility upgrades would greatly benefit future generations of sport, not just shooting.

They're still going ahead with all of the infrastructure, sporting facility upgrades etc. to the tune of about $2.6B.

[MarkS]

To be fair, $7 Billion for a 12 day sporting event is obscene

Whilst that big a number may be hard for you to fathom........

Everyone loves to throw around "the Government is spending $xxxxx Billion dollars on...."
So we can fathom it, how much is One Billion Dollars?
Easy.
We have this massive business in Aus called Bunnings.
I think we all agree, MASSIVE.
The entire Bunnings operation makes about $1.278 Billion p.a.
In other words, One Billion Dollars, it's a sheet tonne of money.

Should we be spending Billions of taxpayers money on "Games" like the 2026 event in Melbourne, the 2032 Olympics in Qld (that literally no one else in the world even bid for).
No

The LA Olympic Games made money.
After that..... nope
Infrastructure "for generations to come". Political spin.
Kids don't give a rats if the local field or pool has millions of dollars worth of stadium wrapped around it.
Maybe just my opinion, as usual. But I did work in the group that bid for Sydney 2000......

[AlanF]

Looking at the $7 billion another way, its about $1000 for every person in Vic, and they still want volunteer labour, plus most Victorians will have to pay huge ticket prices to see the events, and performances will be mostly inferior to the Olympics and world championships. It was never a good idea, and now probably won't happen at all anywhere.

[jasmay]

VIC as a state is broke.

$170billion debt by 2025.

The money has to come from somewhere, where do they get it?

From all the new taxes they are implementing which the people will pay for.

You cannot spend yourself out of debt.

The one thing that amazes me is Dan Andrews got re-elected, that has to be a marketing miracle, the guys a genius, if Dow Corning ever needed a new non stick coating look no further than Dan the Man.

[Brad]

For what it’s worth the turnover for Bunnings at 30 June 2022 was more like $17b, probably higher at 30 June 23.

Andrews getting re-elected has to be the 8th wonder of the world! Perhaps he sold his black soul!

[RDavies]

I understand with our economy the way it has gone lately that we can no longer afford to run a Commonwealth Games, even after running the best Olympic Games
It is a bit embarrassing though that Australia, one of the richer countries in the Commonwealth to have hosted a games has had to pull out as we cant afford it anymore.

[MarkS]

Turnover is totally different to what a business makes(profit) Brad.
So your example is one of Australia's biggest retailers has to turnover $17Billion to make appx $1.3B
Only highlights even more my point of what an extraordinary amount of money a billion dollars really is.

Suppose we actually taxed say Uber, reported annual revenue in Aus of $9.2Billion. Then there may be the money to pay for socially positive facilities and events without taxing the bejesus out of the little guy....

[Brad]

Yes Mark I agree they are very different. It seems I may have mistakenly read your post as referencing turnover.

Of course, if you're going to quote a profit figure then are you referring to pre/post tax profits etc - not sure of your source but according to the accounts for Wesfarmers the EBT for Bunnings was $2.2bn (06/2022). An after-tax figure can be become arbitrary as effective tax rates can vary wildly depending on circumstance.

Can't even begin to imagine the logic/justification for taxing turnover.

Anyway, all largely irrelevant to the matter at hand! Based on the news today it seems quite "surprisingly" the figure quoted by Dan was overstated and with that - Dan referred to cost, may have missed it but didn't see the word loss being utilised.

[macguru]

The comm games is a bit of an odd duck with most of the world not watching it or even remotely interested. As a commonwealth country and as boomers who grew up with the commonwealth we rightly have a soft spot for it but not to the tune of 7 billion, whatever that means. Let Birmingham do it again if the Brits care enough...

[AlanF]

I lost interest in the CW games because most of the World's best don't compete in it, even some who are from CW countries e.g. Usain Bolt never did. Probably because it interfered with preparation for the World Championships. Even Olympics participation is now often compromised by politics. In our sport we should count ourselves lucky to be able to compete at the FCWC.