Tasmania Liberal government falls after vote of no confidence passed in Premier, threatening Devils AFL team

The Tasmanian Parliament voted 18-17 to dismiss the State’s Liberal government, a decision that could trigger an election over the state’s weak finances, possible asset sales and the construction of a football stadium.

After a tied vote that was broken by speaker Michelle O’Byrne, Premier Jeremy Rockliff said he would ask Lieutenant Governor Christopher Shanahan to call an election if the Labor Party cannot secure a parliamentary majority.

“This will be an election that Tasmanians don’t want and Tasmanians can’t afford,” Mr Rockliff said.

Labor leader Dean Winter, who is taking a political risk by triggering an election 16 months his party was defeated in the last one, told reporters: “I can’t stand by and let this Premier ruin this State.”

Budget strife

The Labor opposition has accused the Government of planning to sell off State assets. The Government said it had examined businesses that could be sold but had not committed to selling any.

Complicating the situation, Parliament has not passed a budget for next year, which means there is no legal provision to pay public servants from July 1.

Parliament was immediately suspended after Mr Rockliff gave an emotional speech in response to his Government’s dismissal.

Gesturing to the Labor leader, he said: “It might not end well for me, but this day will define you.”

Constitutional scholar Anne Twomey said the acting governor did not have to act on Rockliff’s advice to call an election, but probably would because the Labor Party does not enough support either.

“I think it would be most likely that the Lieutenant-Governor would accept any advice to dissolve Parliament and hold an election,” she told the Nightly.

The AFL’s choices

Mr Rockliff blamed his downfall in part on the Government’s plan to build a $950 million stadium for a 19th team in the Australian Football League, the Devils.

He said members of his party warned him the project would cost him votes in a State with a large Budget deficit and shortages in government services.

“I have always said: ’Stuff votes’,” the Premier told Parliament. “This is about the future of our State. I damn well believe in it.

The Federal Government and AFL have agreed to subsidise the Devils, but only if they play in a modern stadium with a roof to protect spectators during the cold Tasmanian winters.

Despite polls that showed some Tasmanians were wary of the high cost, Mr Rockliff argued it would drive economic growth in a state that is Australia’s poorest.

Former Collingwood Football Club president Eddie McGuire said the AFL would consider other expansion options if Tasmania rejected the plan.

“What Tasmania doesn’t need is every week to have an advertisement that they are a second-rate state,” he told The Nightly. “I think Tasmania deserves to be finally seen for the great state that it is.”

“You want to be careful 18 club presidents don’t sit down and say ‘we will be be $400 million better off’ without the team,” he said.

“There is a fair bit of investment from the AFL. It will probably cost $30 million a year. If you start saying no and it becomes too much of a pain in the neck, people may say: ‘We could have a third team in Perth, or one of the central coast of NSW, or Darwin or Alice Springs. We need to get on it with or go to plan B.’

“The whole philosophy of this exercise was to take it to world-class level rather than having a game of footy in the wind and rain. The teams need to look like Collingwood at the MCG, Adelaide at Adelaide Oval or Brisbane at the new Olympic stadium.”

Two days

The Parliament took two days to debate on whether to remove the government. It is not clear if the Labor Party has enough votes to take over, given Mr Winter, the leader, ruled out entering a coalition with the Greens party, which has five seats in the 35-member House of Assembly. The Liberals have have 14 seats and Labor ten.

With the fate of his team in the balance, Tasmania Devils chief executive Brendon Gale expressed cautious optimism about entering the AFL in two-and-a-half years.

“I’m confident in what we’ve built, the momentum we’ve generated, and with what’s at stake here that sanity and cool heads will prevail,” he told ABC radio.

With a population around 575,000, Tasmania is a strong support base for AFL, which the competition would like to reward with its own team.

Mr McGuire, one of the AFL leaders who approved the expansion, said the island state’s existing football ovals were “fourth rate” and would not attract enough spectators, including Victorians who would want to fly to Hobart to see their teams play.

The new sports ground and 23,000-seat arena, known as Macquarie Point Stadium, would be built on the site of an old gas works near a sewerage plant on the shore of Storm Bay.

Critics say it is too far from public transport. Supporters say it would rejuvenate a neglected part of the city.