SEQ may bid for 2024 or 2028 Olympics
Posted: Thu Feb 26, 2015 10:02 am
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Discussion of a new Brisbane bid — it campaigned unsuccessfully for the 1992 Games — comes hard on the heels of IOC president Thomas Bach’s call for a fresh Australian entry for either the 2024 or 2028 Games. Bach said Australia had three cities with sufficient infrastructure in place to run a cost-efficient Games.
Although he did not name them, he clearly had in mind Melbourne (1956 host city), Sydney (2000) and Brisbane, which several times has been named by Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates as Australia’s next candidate.
The IOC allocates Games to cities, not countries but for any southeast Queensland bid to get off the ground, the federal and Queensland governments would need to give financial backing.
“It’s early days,” said Quirk. “We’ve got to get the conversation going.”
Earlier this week, former Queensland premier Peter Beattie said he had raised the possibility of a Brisbane bid with Bach’s predecessor, Jacques Rogge, in 2005 and had been advised the earliest the IOC would entertain another Australian city hosting the Games after Sydney was 2024, with 2028 a more realistic chance of success.