Commonwealth Games in Chch is a daft idea

David Williams at Newsroom reports:

Mauger attracted headlines in Saturday’s Press newspaper for his “wishlist”, including a “serious bid” for the 2030 Commonwealth Games. (The Olympic Committee has said it’s considering bidding for the 2034 event.)

Yesterday, city councillors discussed Mauger’s motion to get the ball rolling. What was agreed to was council staff, with input from the city’s economic development arm ChristchurchNZ, would give advice about whether a bid for 2030, or 2034, was viable.

“This is just getting it underway to ask the question: is it possible?” the mayor said, defensively. “They could come back and say it’s an absolute fizzer.”

You don’t need a report. The answer is clearly no.

The important international context here is Victoria (population: 6.5 million), pulled out of hosting the 2026 Commonwealth Games because of cost overruns. Fears over funding also led the Canadian province of Alberta (population: 4.8 million) to scrap its consideration of hosting the 2030 games.

To add to this grim picture, Birmingham (population: 4.3 million in the wider metro area), the British city that hosted the 2022 games, is in dire financial trouble, with its city council effectively declaring itself bankrupt.

A city of a few hundred thousand could never be viable for games in this era.

The Glasgow games cost over a billion dollars and 80% had to be funded by taxpayers or ratepayers. The Melbourne games were looking to cost over $7 billion.