July 28, 2025 • 14 mins
When Tasmanian premier Jeremy Rockliff struck a deal with the AFL to build a brand new stadium in Hobart's historic center, it was a decision made without cabinet, treasury or parliamentary backing.
It's that stadium that's kicked off a messy fight over who will lead Tasmania.
It’s now been over a week since the election that delivered a hung parliament and neither the Liberal leader or Labor leader have managed to form government.
Today, award-winning author Richard Flanagan, on the political crisis in his home state of Tasmania – and why it's a warning for the rest of the country.
If you enjoy 7am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at 7ampodcast.com.au/support.
Socials: Stay in touch with us on Instagram
Guest: Award-winning author Richard Flanagan
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening to seven AM.
When Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockcliffe struck a deal with the
AFL to build a brand new stadium in Hobart's historic center,
it was a decision made without Cabinet, Treasury or parliamentary backing.
(00:23):
It's that stadium that's kicked off a messy fight over
who will lead Tasmania. It's now been over a week
since the election that delivered a hung parliament and neither
the Liberal leader or Labor leader have managed to form government. Today,
author Richard Flanagan on the political crisis in his home
state of Tasmania and why it's a warning for the
rest of the country. It's Tuesday, July twenty nine, So Richard,
(00:55):
welcome to seven AM. Thank you for coming on the show.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Thanks for having me. Raby.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
As we speak, it's been just over a week since
the Tasmanian election, in which neither party gained enough votes
to govern. The cross bench may well decide who ends
up leading the state. So tell me this election, what
would you say it was all about?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Well, I think it's all about an old order crumbling,
but refusing to accept what politics in the twenty first
century is going to look like and rather than it
being a mess, I think it's a harbinger of what's
coming not just to our island here but to Australia.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Tasmonia's fourth election in just seven years has delivered another
hung parliament. The Liberals have again won the most seats,
but falling shy of a majority, will be forced to
negotiate with a largely progressive cross bench to try to
form government.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
A bit over a third vote for the Liberal Party,
a third voted for the cross Bench and about a
court voted for the ALP and so the dilemma here
is that neither the Liberal Party nor Labor Party except
that a large sway that Tasmania doesn't agree or endorse
their policies and is extremely discontented with what they're doing.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
The proposed Macquari Points Stadium has been a contentious topic
in this election. The major parties are supportive of the plan,
which would pave the way for a Tasmania based AFL team.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
There was a lot of discuss with the Liberal Party
and there's a lot of disillusion. That's to do with
the fact that budget now is in crisis in a way,
it just isn't anywhere else in Australia. It's now got
a thirteen billion dollar debt by twenty twenty eight, which
when you add the government businesses to it, is a
(02:45):
further nine billion, So that's a twenty two billion dollar debt.
And the Treasury released a document mid election which said
to address this, you would have to raise taxation by
two hundred and fifty percent, or reduce services by twenty
five percent, or sack twenty thousand public servants.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
All right, So in that context, and let's talk a
bit more about the stadium deal that Jeremy Rockcliffe made
a couple of years ago with the AFL. Under the deal,
Tasmania would build this new stadium and in return they
would get to enter the league. So these are the
terms that the ALFOL wanted and got right.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Yeah, absolutely, Rockcliffe. I mean it was the deal of
the century as far as the AFL goes, because they
got a blank check for a stadium, They specified where
the stadium would go, what type of stadium, it would
be a deadline for when it would be built. And
not only that, if it's not built, I think it's
by twenty twenty eight. The state has to pay a
(03:47):
fine every year. It's not built of several million dollars.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
When Premier Jeremy Rockcliffe or the AFL tells Tasmanians that
there's nine team without a stadium, I say that's rubbish,
poor performance. I've been told by Business Leans that this
was the worst deal they have ever seen. The Tasmanian government.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Doing this idea that a mainland corporation can come in
and just demand that the taxpayer here build their stadium
stagus people, particularly when we already have two stadia which
are routinely used for AFL games here and have been
for the last two decades.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
The Douglas Rockcliffe government rollover and sold Tasmanians out and
your stars as treatss chips. You should be ashamed of yourself, Jeremy,
you should be as lowly as shame for yourself.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
The AFL made the condition of Tasmania getting its own
AFL side that it had to build the stadium. But
Tasmania is actually giving over a quarter of a million
dollars to that AFL team. It is the most generous
state sponsorship of any sporting team in Australian history by
the poorest state at a moment in its history when
(04:55):
it's teaching on bankruptcy. This is a stadium Tasmanian's never
wanted and had consistently opposed. It's always sixty to seventy
percent of Tasmanians when they poled, say they don't want it,
which the Premier nevertheless is hugely committed to.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
So why do you think the Tasmanian government agreed to
those terms?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Well, that's a good question. I think the Tasmanian government
didn't really agree. Premier Rockcliffe signed the contract without reference
to his party room, his cabinet, his treasurer or the treasury,
and having signed it, he's been desperately backfelling ever since,
trying to justify and as time goes by, the ever
(05:39):
more ludicrous nature of the proposal becomes apparent. Nevertheless, you know,
people are united behind the team, but they are not
united behind the stadium.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
After the break, will the stadium deal die? Richard? We've
spoken about the stadium deal itself, the cost of it,
the fact that many Tasmanians don't support it. But if
it were to go ahead, where would this stadium actually be.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Well, the AFL insisted it go in the heart of
colonial Hobart down on the wharf. This creates several problems.
The first is just that it is completely impossible to service.
You can't service it with public transport, you can't adequately
get cars in the way the arterial road system works
(06:36):
into in and out of Hobar. It's going to create
absolute traffic chaos because of the appalling nature of governance
in Tasmania. We have the least expenditure per capita on
public transport of any state in Australia. And we've been
been report showing with the most car centric city and
(06:58):
yet so people will have to to the games by car.
There's nowhere even for them to park their cars. And
then on top of that, it sits next to the Senator,
the equivalent of Melbourne Shrine of Remembrance. This is a
prominent spot in Hobart's topography, on a point overlooking both
the river and the city. There was a plan to
(07:22):
build housing and so on on the site and the
first Indigenous memorial park in Australia dedicated to the frontier walls.
This was a very powerful idea that resonated with Tasmanian people.
Was very popular. The AFL, which claims to care about
indigenous culture rolled over that straight away. They haven't cared
(07:46):
less about it. In fact, the indigenous people who worked
on it, the first they knew about it was hearing
it on the TV news and the radio news. So
all these things were recognized in planning around the city
and future planning. All of them were utterly ignored by
the AFL and then by the government.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
You mentioned some of the challenges that Tasmania faces. Can
we talk a little bit more about that, about about
what you think that the money that Tasmania does have
should be spent on and its political will I suppose,
but it should be directed.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
I think the real problem for Tasmania is that its
politics are utterly distorted by its resource industries and had
for a very long time in Tasmania. From colonial times.
You kept power and you maintained power by the giving
away your aspects of the natural environment, from the kangaroo
hunting grounds, of the power of people that you gave
(08:46):
away to the pastoralss. It's always been about giving away
forest concessions, mining concessions, water to sand and barrens and
so on. Forces behind those industries become unduly powerful, and
that there are two problems with this one is that
there clearly are dirty deals going down all the time here.
(09:07):
We're the only state that doesn't have a proper corruption commission.
But the other problem is is that it destroys the
necessary contractor democracy needs between its people and its state.
And people need to believe that the state, generally speaking,
does what it does in an honest way. Tasmanians don't believe.
(09:29):
That's how they're stage one. They believe everything is corrupted.
Now clearly everything isn't corrupted here, but it creates a
really disaffected, angry and in the sense also disempowered people,
and I think that's why you see so many people
leaving the island.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Let's talk a little bit about the Greens and the
independence the new cross Bench. It's largely against the Stadium deal.
Does it seem to you then that the cross Bench
be able to convince either major party to give up
on this deal. Is this something that can actually die?
Speaker 2 (10:08):
So the final makeup of the Parliament won't be known
until the end of this week, and it's those final
crossbenches that are still up in the air. But you
are right, the majority of the cross Bench or opposed
to the Stadium. The real negotiations will start next week
and clearly the stadium's going to be a key issue,
(10:29):
and I guess the question is is whether the Labor
Party will flip on it or not. The Labor Party
opposed the stadium up to last election, then immediately after
it changed to a pro stadium position, which was sort
of bizarre because it was seen that part of the
reason for the Liberal Party collapse was their support of
the stadium. The Labor Party vote this year in the
(10:52):
election's gone is the lowest in its one hundred and
twenty year history, and this is coming off a very
good result in the federal election. So it tells you
a lot about these extreme right wing positions that the
Labor Party has taken in recent times. So it's a
conceit on the part of both major parties that the
(11:12):
growth in the cross bench is a momentary aberration at
some point will go back to where it's you know,
it's just holding law forward, but it's just Labor or Liberal.
But it's never going to go back to that. And
the people in the twenty first century who will have
effect and be capable of changing our society, whether it's
for the better or the worse, will be people who
(11:35):
are able to pull together coalitions of constantly changing forces,
micro parties, different individuals. They won't necessarily all be progressive either,
but they will be the new style of politics. And
at the moment in Tasmania neither labor nor liberal except
(11:55):
the legitimacy of this change.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
Yeah, and as you say, we don't know the final
makeup of the Tasmanian Parliament yet. But should the stadium
go ahead, what kind of reaction do you expect.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Well, because of this pattern of powerful corporations pulling the
streams behind closed doors, there is a very strong grassroots
political culture. You know, this is the island that gave
Australia the environment movement, the Green Party. And what you
will see if the stadium goes ahead is you'll see
(12:31):
direct action on the stadium side. You'll see homeless people
chaining themselves to machinery. You'll see health activists chaining themselves
to machinery. You'll see the state respond as it does
down here, by imprisoning those people. And then you're going
to get rage. And if the AFL really wants to
(12:53):
go to war with the people of Tasmania, well then
that's where we're heading. If this stadium goes ahead, So
even if Parliament approves it, it won't be the end
of the story, but only the beginning of a more
bitter chapter.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Richard, thank you so much for your time today.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Bath thank you.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Also in the news today, Ed Husick says Australia should
recognize a Palestinian state now, saying France's decision to do
so should be seen as an opportunity. The former cabinet minister,
who was dumped from the ministry after the election, made
the comments following the Prime Minister saying over the weekend
that hurdles must be overcome before recognition is possible. And
(13:46):
National's leader David little Proud has dismissed suggestions that Barnaby
Joyce's attempts to scrap net zero is a sign of
party revolt. Little Proud said that backbenchers have every right
to bring forward private members' bills following Joys introduction of
the bill that would get rid of Australia's net zero
target by twenty fifty. The bill has no prospect of succeeding.
(14:08):
I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven am. Thanks for listening.
Hi, I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening to seven AM.
When Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockcliffe struck a deal with the
AFL to build a brand new stadium in Hobart's historic center,
it was a decision made without Cabinet, Treasury or parliamentary backing.
(00:23):
It's that stadium that's kicked off a messy fight over
who will lead Tasmania. It's now been over a week
since the election that delivered a hung parliament and neither
the Liberal leader or Labor leader have managed to form government. Today,
author Richard Flanagan on the political crisis in his home
state of Tasmania and why it's a warning for the
rest of the country. It's Tuesday, July twenty nine, So Richard,
(00:55):
welcome to seven AM. Thank you for coming on the show.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Thanks for having me. Raby.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
As we speak, it's been just over a week since
the Tasmanian election, in which neither party gained enough votes
to govern. The cross bench may well decide who ends
up leading the state. So tell me this election, what
would you say it was all about?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Well, I think it's all about an old order crumbling,
but refusing to accept what politics in the twenty first
century is going to look like and rather than it
being a mess, I think it's a harbinger of what's
coming not just to our island here but to Australia.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Tasmonia's fourth election in just seven years has delivered another
hung parliament. The Liberals have again won the most seats,
but falling shy of a majority, will be forced to
negotiate with a largely progressive cross bench to try to
form government.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
A bit over a third vote for the Liberal Party,
a third voted for the cross Bench and about a
court voted for the ALP and so the dilemma here
is that neither the Liberal Party nor Labor Party except
that a large sway that Tasmania doesn't agree or endorse
their policies and is extremely discontented with what they're doing.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
The proposed Macquari Points Stadium has been a contentious topic
in this election. The major parties are supportive of the plan,
which would pave the way for a Tasmania based AFL team.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
There was a lot of discuss with the Liberal Party
and there's a lot of disillusion. That's to do with
the fact that budget now is in crisis in a way,
it just isn't anywhere else in Australia. It's now got
a thirteen billion dollar debt by twenty twenty eight, which
when you add the government businesses to it, is a
(02:45):
further nine billion, So that's a twenty two billion dollar debt.
And the Treasury released a document mid election which said
to address this, you would have to raise taxation by
two hundred and fifty percent, or reduce services by twenty
five percent, or sack twenty thousand public servants.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
All right, So in that context, and let's talk a
bit more about the stadium deal that Jeremy Rockcliffe made
a couple of years ago with the AFL. Under the deal,
Tasmania would build this new stadium and in return they
would get to enter the league. So these are the
terms that the ALFOL wanted and got right.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Yeah, absolutely, Rockcliffe. I mean it was the deal of
the century as far as the AFL goes, because they
got a blank check for a stadium, They specified where
the stadium would go, what type of stadium, it would
be a deadline for when it would be built. And
not only that, if it's not built, I think it's
by twenty twenty eight. The state has to pay a
(03:47):
fine every year. It's not built of several million dollars.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
When Premier Jeremy Rockcliffe or the AFL tells Tasmanians that
there's nine team without a stadium, I say that's rubbish,
poor performance. I've been told by Business Leans that this
was the worst deal they have ever seen. The Tasmanian government.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Doing this idea that a mainland corporation can come in
and just demand that the taxpayer here build their stadium
stagus people, particularly when we already have two stadia which
are routinely used for AFL games here and have been
for the last two decades.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
The Douglas Rockcliffe government rollover and sold Tasmanians out and
your stars as treatss chips. You should be ashamed of yourself, Jeremy,
you should be as lowly as shame for yourself.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
The AFL made the condition of Tasmania getting its own
AFL side that it had to build the stadium. But
Tasmania is actually giving over a quarter of a million
dollars to that AFL team. It is the most generous
state sponsorship of any sporting team in Australian history by
the poorest state at a moment in its history when
(04:55):
it's teaching on bankruptcy. This is a stadium Tasmanian's never
wanted and had consistently opposed. It's always sixty to seventy
percent of Tasmanians when they poled, say they don't want it,
which the Premier nevertheless is hugely committed to.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
So why do you think the Tasmanian government agreed to
those terms?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Well, that's a good question. I think the Tasmanian government
didn't really agree. Premier Rockcliffe signed the contract without reference
to his party room, his cabinet, his treasurer or the treasury,
and having signed it, he's been desperately backfelling ever since,
trying to justify and as time goes by, the ever
(05:39):
more ludicrous nature of the proposal becomes apparent. Nevertheless, you know,
people are united behind the team, but they are not
united behind the stadium.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
After the break, will the stadium deal die? Richard? We've
spoken about the stadium deal itself, the cost of it,
the fact that many Tasmanians don't support it. But if
it were to go ahead, where would this stadium actually be.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Well, the AFL insisted it go in the heart of
colonial Hobart down on the wharf. This creates several problems.
The first is just that it is completely impossible to service.
You can't service it with public transport, you can't adequately
get cars in the way the arterial road system works
(06:36):
into in and out of Hobar. It's going to create
absolute traffic chaos because of the appalling nature of governance
in Tasmania. We have the least expenditure per capita on
public transport of any state in Australia. And we've been
been report showing with the most car centric city and
(06:58):
yet so people will have to to the games by car.
There's nowhere even for them to park their cars. And
then on top of that, it sits next to the Senator,
the equivalent of Melbourne Shrine of Remembrance. This is a
prominent spot in Hobart's topography, on a point overlooking both
the river and the city. There was a plan to
(07:22):
build housing and so on on the site and the
first Indigenous memorial park in Australia dedicated to the frontier walls.
This was a very powerful idea that resonated with Tasmanian people.
Was very popular. The AFL, which claims to care about
indigenous culture rolled over that straight away. They haven't cared
(07:46):
less about it. In fact, the indigenous people who worked
on it, the first they knew about it was hearing
it on the TV news and the radio news. So
all these things were recognized in planning around the city
and future planning. All of them were utterly ignored by
the AFL and then by the government.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
You mentioned some of the challenges that Tasmania faces. Can
we talk a little bit more about that, about about
what you think that the money that Tasmania does have
should be spent on and its political will I suppose,
but it should be directed.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
I think the real problem for Tasmania is that its
politics are utterly distorted by its resource industries and had
for a very long time in Tasmania. From colonial times.
You kept power and you maintained power by the giving
away your aspects of the natural environment, from the kangaroo
hunting grounds, of the power of people that you gave
(08:46):
away to the pastoralss. It's always been about giving away
forest concessions, mining concessions, water to sand and barrens and
so on. Forces behind those industries become unduly powerful, and
that there are two problems with this one is that
there clearly are dirty deals going down all the time here.
(09:07):
We're the only state that doesn't have a proper corruption commission.
But the other problem is is that it destroys the
necessary contractor democracy needs between its people and its state.
And people need to believe that the state, generally speaking,
does what it does in an honest way. Tasmanians don't believe.
(09:29):
That's how they're stage one. They believe everything is corrupted.
Now clearly everything isn't corrupted here, but it creates a
really disaffected, angry and in the sense also disempowered people,
and I think that's why you see so many people
leaving the island.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Let's talk a little bit about the Greens and the
independence the new cross Bench. It's largely against the Stadium deal.
Does it seem to you then that the cross Bench
be able to convince either major party to give up
on this deal. Is this something that can actually die?
Speaker 2 (10:08):
So the final makeup of the Parliament won't be known
until the end of this week, and it's those final
crossbenches that are still up in the air. But you
are right, the majority of the cross Bench or opposed
to the Stadium. The real negotiations will start next week
and clearly the stadium's going to be a key issue,
(10:29):
and I guess the question is is whether the Labor
Party will flip on it or not. The Labor Party
opposed the stadium up to last election, then immediately after
it changed to a pro stadium position, which was sort
of bizarre because it was seen that part of the
reason for the Liberal Party collapse was their support of
the stadium. The Labor Party vote this year in the
(10:52):
election's gone is the lowest in its one hundred and
twenty year history, and this is coming off a very
good result in the federal election. So it tells you
a lot about these extreme right wing positions that the
Labor Party has taken in recent times. So it's a
conceit on the part of both major parties that the
(11:12):
growth in the cross bench is a momentary aberration at
some point will go back to where it's you know,
it's just holding law forward, but it's just Labor or Liberal.
But it's never going to go back to that. And
the people in the twenty first century who will have
effect and be capable of changing our society, whether it's
for the better or the worse, will be people who
(11:35):
are able to pull together coalitions of constantly changing forces,
micro parties, different individuals. They won't necessarily all be progressive either,
but they will be the new style of politics. And
at the moment in Tasmania neither labor nor liberal except
(11:55):
the legitimacy of this change.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
Yeah, and as you say, we don't know the final
makeup of the Tasmanian Parliament yet. But should the stadium
go ahead, what kind of reaction do you expect.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Well, because of this pattern of powerful corporations pulling the
streams behind closed doors, there is a very strong grassroots
political culture. You know, this is the island that gave
Australia the environment movement, the Green Party. And what you
will see if the stadium goes ahead is you'll see
(12:31):
direct action on the stadium side. You'll see homeless people
chaining themselves to machinery. You'll see health activists chaining themselves
to machinery. You'll see the state respond as it does
down here, by imprisoning those people. And then you're going
to get rage. And if the AFL really wants to
(12:53):
go to war with the people of Tasmania, well then
that's where we're heading. If this stadium goes ahead, So
even if Parliament approves it, it won't be the end
of the story, but only the beginning of a more
bitter chapter.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Richard, thank you so much for your time today.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Bath thank you.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Also in the news today, Ed Husick says Australia should
recognize a Palestinian state now, saying France's decision to do
so should be seen as an opportunity. The former cabinet minister,
who was dumped from the ministry after the election, made
the comments following the Prime Minister saying over the weekend
that hurdles must be overcome before recognition is possible. And
(13:46):
National's leader David little Proud has dismissed suggestions that Barnaby
Joyce's attempts to scrap net zero is a sign of
party revolt. Little Proud said that backbenchers have every right
to bring forward private members' bills following Joys introduction of
the bill that would get rid of Australia's net zero
target by twenty fifty. The bill has no prospect of succeeding.
(14:08):
I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven am. Thanks for listening.
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