Victoria’s Tourism Minister has sledged Perth’s bid to host the 2030 Gay Games saying Melbourne is superior to Western Australia’s capital.
Steve Dimopoulos fronted the cameras on Saturday to voice his support for Melbourne’s bid to host the international event. Melbourne and Perth are among the seven cities short listed for the event.
“I love Perth, but seriously – it’s Perth.” the Minister said before going on to say there no comparison between the two cities.
‘Melbourne is a global city.” Dimopoulos told reporters.
Perth and Melbourne are both being considered for the event alongside Auckland, Cape Town, Denver, Taipei and Edmonton in Canada.
The 10-day event usually attracts around 5,000 participants and is seen as a boon for tourism for the host city. Unlike the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games participation is presented on an open access model, and anyone can complete regardless of their sexuality or expertise level at each sport.
Melbourne’s Gay Games bid criticised following failed Commonwealth Games project
Melbourne’s bid to host the Gay Games has been criticised in the wake of the state’s abandoned Commonwealth Games project.
A recent report from Victoria’s Auditor General found that the state had spent $589 million on the plan to bid the 2026 Commonwealth Games. This included $150 million in staff and operating costs and a $380 million settlement for pulling out of the event.
The Commonwealth Games was originally budgeted to cost the state $2.6 billion, but was cancelled by then-Premier Daniel Andrews when it was anticipated costs would blow out to $7 billion. The recent report however suggested that the final estimate had been overblown.
The organisers of the Gay Games say their event can bring major tourism income to the host city, the Paris Games in 2018 had a total economic impact of $117.9 million.
Criticism of Melbourne’s bid to host the event became a high rotation talking point on Sky News.
Freya Leach, Director of the Centre for Youth Policy at the Menzies Research Centre said the event would likely cost the government hundreds of millions of dollars, even though the event has been shown to be highly profitable in the past.
“I would not trust the Victorian government to run anything properly or on budget.” Leach said on Sunday Showdown. “If I was a Victorian taxpayer, hearing that our government is going to spend another couple hundreds of millions of dollars for some gay games then I would be pretty annoyed.”
Sky News host James Morrow commented on the event on Outsiders on Sunday morning saying the decision to support the Gay Games after abandoning the bid to host the Commonwealth Games was part of a conspiracy to destroy traditional values.
“There’s this really concerted effort by the left to shit what the public imagery is, what the things are that we care about. They want to downgrade the Commonwealth, but they want to put sexuality, and alternative sexualities, front and centre.
“This all part of a much bigger program to undermine traditional things in our society.” Morrow claimed.
