EY stands by original business case for cancelled Games

afr.com:

Consultants say they stand by their work done on the original business case for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, despite the Victorian government later claiming costs had more than doubled when they cancelled the event.

Meanwhile, Commonwealth Games Australia president Ben Houston and chief executive Craig Phillips on Monday said they hoped another Australian state or city could host the Games.

Commonwealth Games Australia boss Craig Phillips took questions during the Senate inquiry. Eamon Gallagher

Premier Daniel Andrews announced last month the Games in Victoria would be cancelled because costs had blown out from $2.6 billion to up to $7 billion. Mr Andrews later described the business case that helped his government decide to host the Games as “not the greatest piece of work”.

Leigh Walker, a partner at EY, who contributed to the original business, told a Senate inquiry on Monday: “We stand by the quality of our work.”

Mrs Walker also said she could not point to any other costings work that had blown out as much as the Games in the same time frame.

Another EY partner, Dean Yates, said: “We provided a range of best-case and worst-case scenarios. And that information was developed based on information known at the time.”

Mr Houston said neither Commonwealth Games Australia nor the Commonwealth Games Federation had asked for a confidentiality clause to be included in the $380 million settlement deal reached with the state government over the Games.

“We didn’t suggest it,” Mr Houston told the Senate inquiry into Australia’s preparedness to host Commonwealth, Olympic and Paralympic Games in Melbourne on Monday.

Nationals senators Matt Canavan and Bridget McKenzie have used a federal inquiry to apply heat to the Victorian