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March 26, 2026 12 mins

The head of the construction company who built the new One New Zealand Stadium is pleased the stadium has been delivered to the city ahead of time and on budget. 

Mark Baker, CEO of Australian firm BESIX Watpac, is in Christchurch for the ribbon cutting ceremony at the new stadium and joined John MacDonald for a chat during his short visit in Christchurch. 

"it's been a while in the post COVID era where we're able to say that we've delivered ahead of time, and pleasingly we have."

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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Canterbury Mornings podcast with John McDonald
from News Talk ZB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Mark Morning, John, how.

Speaker 3 (00:14):
Are you very well that you've delivered the stadium? Tell
me I've got it right on time and on budget.
How the hell did you do that?

Speaker 2 (00:22):
Well? Can I just say one thing in relationship that
and I'll probably get in trouble from the council, who's
our client on this. We actually like to say we
delivered it ahead of time and on budget. US builders,
particularly in this environment, are really pleased to be able
to say that it's not has been a while in
the post COVID era before we're able to say that
we've delivered ahead of time, and pleasingly we have.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Well, let's get it right, we deal with facts. How
far ahead of time?

Speaker 2 (00:47):
I'll probably get in trouble for saying this? No months?

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Months?

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (00:51):
Is that right?

Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (00:52):
Wow? Why do you keep saying I'll probably get in
trouble for this? Which is music to my ears.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Along the journey, we always knew we were tracking towards
an early completion, and I think the council, in their wisdom,
it makes good sense not to over promise, and so
they were very cautious when I was over telling all
of the people on our side of the business, you
know that we're going to deliver this on time or
ahead of time. I should say Council was very cautious

(01:19):
of saying that. Don't say that to the people of
New Zealand. Don't well get.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
Expectations too high, in particular people to christ churches because
time we're so used over the last fifteen years to timelines,
you know, just going down the Google.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah, and I remember, I'll come back to your question
in a second, but I remember I did a radio
interview at the very very start of the project once
we'd signed the contract. I think it's about July twenty two,
and it was a live, live cross and I was
asked the question, will you deliver this stadium on time?
And I said, April twenty six, will have the stadium delivered.
And so it actually is pretty good to be able
to sit here and say, well, we're not quite in

(01:53):
April twenty six and we delivered the stadium and handed
it over, so how do we do it? Yeah, I
think it really comes out to the fact that we're
stadium experts. We really know what we're doing. So that's
a great foundation from which to start. But ultimately our
business is all about collaboration with the local communities and
the local supply chain and subcontractors and so from the

(02:14):
very first time that we set foot in christ Church
in twenty twenty one, it was about understanding the supply chain,
the local capacity, and working with them to optimize the
outcome that we could deliver. So making sure that the
way that we adopted the methodology, how we structured the
outcomes that we're trying to achieve, how we packaged up

(02:36):
parts of the work in order to ensure the local
supply chain could deliver. It was really part of the
solution in being able to deliver it early.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
See I'll put cars on the table. I was very
skeptical at the start of this fixed price contract.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yes, yes, I was a little bit nervous myself. One
must have. But it was one of those things. And
we always liked clients to tell us what they want,
like be honest. And I often say, you know, there's
a lot of words banded around like value for money,
what is value for money? What are we trying to achieve?
And to their credit, chrosh At City Council and also

(03:11):
the delivery board. They'd said to us from day one,
we want we can't do anything other than a fixed
price contract. So what we did is collaboratively worked on
the design. So we worked at putting it together, putting
the design together for a long period of time, making
sure we de risked the project as much as possible.
We understood where the risks were, we priced the risk,

(03:33):
we allocated the risks appropriately, and we just went and
got on with a job. And so we respectively knew
exactly what we were going to do, and we understood
where the pain points were, who was responsible, and how
we would go about undertaking the challenges to get through them.
And I think that was a really really great model
for delivery of critical infrastructure projects.

Speaker 3 (03:53):
How needs did to get when they sort of got
a little bit movie about the cost blowout and talked
about reducing the capacity.

Speaker 2 (03:59):
Yeah, well, I was very nervous that the project wasn't
going to go. Initially I thought it was a bit
of posturing, because you know, clients say, oh, you know,
this might not go ahead of your people exactly exactly.
But in those days, you've got to remember back into
twenty one into twenty two, the market was going it
crazy from a construction price point of view, Steel in particular,

(04:21):
you know, was very bouncy from a pricing perspective. We'd
seen escalation of twenty thirty percent and this thing's got
quite literally tons of steel in it, so it was
quite a difficult journey for us to navigate. And then
when we heard about this thing about Council going to
rate payers to get feedback on whether or they wanted

(04:42):
it to go ahead, I thought they were pulling my leg.
I've never heard of that before.

Speaker 3 (04:46):
Did you tell them that?

Speaker 1 (04:47):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Absolutely, And I remember having a conversation with Barry Bragg,
who hopefully doesn't mind me talking about this. He's the
chair of the Delivery Board, and he was saying, well,
Council might not accept this, you know, and the people
of christ Church might not accept it. And I was thinking,
we've been working together for almost twelve months, we're doing
early works on the project, doing groundworks and ground conditions improvements.

(05:11):
How is that possible? And ultimately it was, and you know,
we remember I remember sitting in Australia and in Brisbane
in their head offers, watching you know, the vote being
read out in council Chambers live stream and then I
think there was a round of applause or something like that,
or somebody even might have done the Harker or something
to celebrate the I was I was very nervous because

(05:36):
my bosses over in Brussels where we're headquartered. From a
global point of view, I think they they obviously backed
my decision to make sure that we had the price right,
in the program right so we could deliver excellence, which
I think is what we've done. But at the same time,
you know, it's a really iconic project, and you know

(05:56):
we're known throughout the world for delivering what others can't
and and this is just another demonstration of I think,
you know, where others might have failed before us in
delivering infrastructure, particularly in New Zealand, you know we've been
able to do it. And I think it's fantastic to
be able to city today and to have that on
our rap sheet.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
I've touched on your other work around the globe shortly.
What do you think is going to be the biggest
challenge that one New Zealand stadium in christ Church is
going to face.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
I can't really see a lot of challenges, to be honest,
I only see opportunities. I think that what has been
delivered is remarkable for the people of christ Church. We've
seen it. We've seen how stadia like this can activate
a precinct and activate a city. We've just come before
this project that the previous stadium we built was in
north Queensland in Townsville. For those of you who know Townsville,

(06:50):
it's it's not far north Queensland. It's certainly much much
north of Brisbane. And I remember at the time when
the budget was allocated by the Queensland government and the
federal government to build that, there was a commentary around
the local community is to why aren't we using this
money for water security, water infrastructure, critical infrastructure. And then

(07:15):
this this stadium gets built just adjacent to the city,
very similar to what we're seeing here at one New
Zealand stadium. The activation that it's given, that the renewed
life that it is given the people, the city, the bars,
the clubs, the restaurants, it's remarkable. And I often say,
if you were to sit down, like you know, all
the good bureaucrats and politicians doing, they do a PDR

(07:37):
or project value assessment or a feasibility analysis as those
in the privacy private sector talk about, you would never
get a stadium to stack up in this part of
the world. I think it's different in the States, but
in this part of the world. But the social outcomes
I think that come with building something like this, you know,
the joy that it brings to people's lives, whether it's

(08:00):
a game of football, watching the beloved Crusaders or the
All Blacks, or you know, maybe even the New Zealand Warrior,
or even acts like I know that we've got Robbie Williams,
I think a few others food fighters coming. I just
don't think that money can buy that sort of stuff.
And particularly, you know, we're living in a very interesting

(08:21):
time in the world's history at the moment, and for
people to put that to the side and be able
to come and enjoy themselves in a place like one
New Zealand Stadium, I think it's remarkable.

Speaker 3 (08:30):
I see you guys are saying that ninety percent of
the workforce that's worked on stadium has been local, which
I've found quite interesting and I think people listening well
as well, because it seems that there's been a hell
of a lot of foreign workers involved.

Speaker 2 (08:44):
Yeah, I guess that might have been the perception because
because those that were visible to the public were probably
those workers that were working on the external parts of
the project. You might have seen, you know, a few
welders up in up in boxes working, you know, doing
some of the welding and like.

Speaker 3 (09:01):
In ours of darkness, hours of darkness.

Speaker 2 (09:04):
Yeah, yeah, is.

Speaker 3 (09:04):
That normally how you do things?

Speaker 2 (09:06):
Well, it's not normally how we would normally see things
operate in Australia, given the environment there. But I think
it's good to be able to add to the local
capability and capacity, you know, for those workers that can
deliver these sorts of things, and they came over, they supplemented,
as you said, the ninety percent sort of or so
local workers, and you know, when they're away from home.

(09:30):
I think the modus operandi is let's get in there
and let's get it done so we can go home.
But I still think to be able to achieve the
outcome we did with the local workforce who probably were
working behind closed doors so to speak a little bit
and so out of public view, and that's why that
perception might have been there. I think it's great to
be able to work collaborative with all people.

Speaker 3 (09:51):
So you talk about for the company working around the world.
I see you're involved in the construction of the new
Guggenheim Museum and Abu Dhrby. Yes, how the hell's that
going right now?

Speaker 2 (10:02):
Well, that's a very very interesting question. I won't say
it's going swimmingly well because it's a very very complex project.
If you've seen architectural images of it, and it's probably
ninety percent of the way through at the moment from
a built form point of view, so you can actually
see it in real life. I was over there about
six months ago having a look at it. Is an

(10:22):
incredible project. The intricate detail that goes into that how
to actually put this thing together is unbelievable. But in
that part of the world, I think the budget's allocated
to these projects are quite significant, and you know, we
always take those challenges. I mean, you know, we have
been in the Middle East for over sixty years now.

(10:45):
We built the Bersh Khalifa, we built the Gugenheim, and
we're building the Googenheim, as you said, and most recently
we handed over the Zayad National Museum in Aberdabi, so
just up the road from the Gugenheim and if anyone
was to google the Zaiad National Museum, you'd be pretty
blown away by what you're able to deliver in that

(11:05):
part of the world.

Speaker 3 (11:06):
So the war and all the consequences, it's just work
as usual for you guys in Abderabi.

Speaker 2 (11:13):
Some projects have been impacted or some facilities that we
operate over there, because we also we build and operate
assets in the Middle East, and one of those assets
at school, and unfortunately we've had to we had to
evacuate the school because you know, there's been some trapnel.
It's fallen out of the sky, unfortunately, and you can't

(11:33):
take that risk with particularly with young kids at school.
Most of the projects, though, it is unfortunately a bit
of a business as usual. Let's get on with get
on with a job, watch and make sure that there's
no immediate danger to the workers or anyone else in
the vicinity of the projects. But yeah, I was over

(11:55):
in Brussels last week with a number of colleagues who
had made the trip up from Dubai and from Abu Dhabi,
and it's a difficult time, but they're just trying to
keep on, keeping on and getting on with what they do.

Speaker 3 (12:06):
All right, Hey, I know you're on in crosis for
a few hours. You're going to be back at some point,
maybe to see Robbie, maybe to see the food fighters.
It's tempted to see the stadium in action.

Speaker 2 (12:15):
Well, it will come and probably is no surprise that
we've got a box at the stadium, so I'll be back.
Is that what you're built first, That's right, it'll be.
It'll be the well serviced box. But no, I'm here first,
first first game or first weekend I should say for
Super Rugby round. I'll be here for all three days,
so I can't wait for the Friday night for the
Crusaders to come out there, run on the field and

(12:37):
hopefully get a win and that be the new fortress
for the Crusaders for the next ten years.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Hopeful, very very nice to see your Mark and all
the best.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
Thank you very much. John.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
For more from Canterbory Mornings with John McDonald, listen live
to news Talks It'd be christ Church from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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