Repository file
Capture — three times the cost
evidence/2023/three-times-the-cost/source.md
From Can’t Explain Raw capture
Capture — three times the cost
- Claim filed: “What's become clear is that the cost of hosting these Games in 2026 is not the $2.6 billion which was budgeted and allocated.”
- Who: Daniel Andrews, 18 July 2023
- URL: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-18/commonwealth-games-regional-victoria-scrapped-daniel-andrews/102613718
- Date on page: 18 July 2023
- Publisher: ABC News
- Title: Commonwealth Games scrapped in regional Victoria as government redirects allocated money
- Captured: 2026-08-14
- Method: saved HTML (
abc-2023-07-18.html)
Verbatim (ABC)
What's become clear is that the cost of hosting these Games in 2026 is not the $2.6 billion which was budgeted and allocated
I will not take money out of hospitals and schools to host an event that is three times the cost estimated and budgeted for last year.
ABC also: costs “could have seen the Games cost at least $6 billion.”
The other meter — VAGO
vago-withdrawal.html / abc-vago-2024-03-20.html / guardian-vago-2024-03-20.html
https://www.audit.vic.gov.au/report/withdrawal-2026-commonwealth-games/
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-20/commonwealth-games-victoria-cancelled-cost-revealed-report/103608858
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/mar/20/victorias-scrapped-2026-commonwealth-games-cost-589m-in-significant-waste-of-taxpayer-money-auditor-general-says
VAGO, 20 March 2024:
The original Games budget was unrealistically low, but the $6.9 billion cost estimate the government publicly released when it withdrew from the Games was overstated.
The cost estimate for the Games that the government publicly released in August 2023 of $6.9 billion was overstated and not transparent. It added significant amounts for industrial relations and cost escalation risks. But it did not disclose that the budget already included $1 billion in contingency allowances to cover these and other cost risks.
Fair presentation of the contingency: about $5.9 billion, not $6.9 billion.
On the $2.6 billion:
- DJSIR briefed the minister for a high-case gross budget of up to $3.2 billion.
- Final submission the same day recommended the low-case $2.7 billion (VAGO: change “at the request of the Minister’s office”).
- 2022–23 Budget printed $2.6 billion.
- VAGO: using the best-case was “unwarranted optimism bias.” At worst, “unrealistic and misleading.”
Allan, ABC same day as the audit: the report “confirm[s] that we made the right decision.”
What this file does not do
It does not file “host at any price.” It files the signed low number and the cancellation high number against the auditor’s two corrections.