# Who runs Brisbane 2032: the committee, the authority, the governments Two statutory bodies, three levels of government and the Olympic movement share the 2032 Games. Here is what each one decides, who it answers to and who a resident deals with. --- A fence goes up around a park, a notice about night works lands in the letterbox, a rumour starts about land being resumed for a venue. The first question a resident asks is simple: who is behind this? For Brisbane 2032 the honest answer is that it depends on what "this" is. The Games are not run by one organisation. They are shared between two bodies created by a Queensland Act, several State departments, the Australian Government, a handful of councils and the international and national Olympic and Paralympic organisations. Each has a different job, a different boss and a different legal standing. This guide sets out the cast, one body at a time, using the Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games Arrangements Act 2021 as it stood on 1 September 2026, the notes published with its amending bills, the intergovernmental agreement between Canberra and Queensland, and the bodies' own pages. It then turns to three practical cases: works at a venue, a road closure and a land acquisition. Names are given with the date of the source that reports them. Boards and ministries change; the role is what lasts.
15directors at most on the organising committee board
7board members listed by the infrastructure authority
17new and upgraded venues the authority must deliver

Board limit from section 17 of the Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games Arrangements Act 2021; board list and venue count from the Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority, read in October 2026.

## One Act, two bodies and a table above them Almost everything about who runs the Games traces back to one Queensland statute, the Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games Arrangements Act 2021. Parliament passed it after the International Olympic Committee chose Brisbane on 21 July 2021, and has amended it several times since, most heavily in 2025. The Act creates two bodies. The first it calls "the corporation": the Brisbane Organising Committee for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, known to most people simply as Brisbane 2032. The second it calls "the authority": the Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority, usually shortened to GIICA. Above both, the Act sets up a Games Leadership Group, a table where the governments and the two bodies settle strategy together. Around them sit the "Games Delivery Partners", the term the Queensland Government uses for the organisations that share the work. The intergovernmental agreement lists Brisbane City Council, the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast councils and the Australian Olympic Committee among them. The table below is the short version.
The main bodies behind Brisbane 2032Legal footing and line of accountability
BodyLegal footingMain jobAnswers to
Organising committeeStatutory body that does not represent the StateOrganise, promote and stage the GamesIts board; a funding agreement with the Minister
Infrastructure authorityStatutory body that represents the StateDeliver the authority venues on timeIts board; the Minister and the department head
Games Leadership GroupGroup set up by section 55A of the ActStrategic direction and coordinationMembership is decided by the Minister
Queensland GovernmentSignatory to the Olympic Host ContractUnderwrite, fund, legislate, coordinateParliament
Australian GovernmentParty to the intergovernmental agreementCo-fund venues and transport, federal servicesFederal Parliament
CouncilsLocal government; board and advisory seatsCity services, local roads, some venuesTheir ratepayers

Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games Arrangements Act 2021 (version in force on 1 September 2026); Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games Intergovernmental Agreement, version 2.0.

## The organising committee: the body that stages the Games Section 6 of the Act establishes the organising committee and section 7 makes it a body corporate that can sue and be sued in its own name. Section 9 gives its main function: to organise, conduct, promote and commercially and financially manage the Games. The Queensland Government's page on the committee spells that out. The committee is also to become a party to the host contract. It organises the events and the ceremonies, including the torch relays and the opening and closing ceremonies. It drives sponsorship, ticketing and broadcasting. It delivers the temporary Games infrastructure known as overlay, meaning the stands, tents, fences and fit-out that appear for the event and leave afterwards. It houses and moves competitors, officials and media, and it manages the volunteers. What it does not do is build stadiums. For most of the years before 2032 the hoardings and trucks near a site are the authority's, and the organising committee arrives later with the overlay and the event itself. The committee's board is fixed by section 17 of the Act at up to 15 directors. Until July 2025 it had 24 members and six vice presidents. A Queensland Government statement of 19 July 2025 announced the smaller board and two vice presidents, after amendments that followed the State's 100 Day Review. The seats are set out in the Act: - up to three independent directors nominated by the Minister - one Queensland Government representative nominated by the Minister - one director nominated by the Prime Minister - one each nominated by the Lord Mayor of Brisbane, the Gold Coast mayor and the Sunshine Coast mayor - one elected Olympian and one elected Paralympian - the president of the Australian Olympic Committee, and its honorary life president or otherwise its chief executive - the president of Paralympics Australia - any Australian member of the International Olympic Committee and any Australian resident on the governing board of the International Paralympic Committee The president is appointed by the Governor in Council, on the Minister's recommendation, from among the independent directors. Andrew Liveris was confirmed as president in the July 2025 statement, and the Associated Press still reported him in the role at the unveiling of the Games emblems on 5 October 2026. The two vice presidents are the State's representative and the Prime Minister's nominee, named in that statement as Tim Mander and Anika Wells; the same Associated Press report describes Mr Mander as a vice president. The chief executive, who runs the committee day to day and is accountable to the board, is Cindy Hook, according to the Queensland Government's page. The same July 2025 statement announced four advisory groups to the board: First Nations, athletes and sport, councils, and commercial. The councils group is chaired by Brisbane's Lord Mayor. ## Why the committee is not the State One line of the Act is worth a pause. Section 7 says the corporation does not represent the State. Section 53ABA says the opposite of the authority: it represents the State and has the State's privileges and immunities.
Worth knowing

The organising committee is a public body, but it is not the Crown

The committee is a statutory body under Queensland's financial accountability laws and a unit of public administration under the Crime and Corruption Act 2001. It still acts in its own name, not the State's. The infrastructure authority, by contrast, acts as the State.

The committee therefore stands at arm's length from the government of the day, though not far from it. Section 10A requires the committee to have a funding agreement with the Minister, with financial monitoring and reporting. A nominee of the Minister attends board and committee meetings. The Minister approves the chief executive's pay and conditions, and section 48 requires the board to tell the Premier and the Prime Minister about a proposed chief executive appointment, with a process for the Prime Minister to object. The committee is temporary. Under sections 52 and 53 a regulation will set a dissolution day after the Games, the Minister must consult the International Olympic Committee before recommending it, and on that day the State becomes the committee's successor in law, taking over its assets, rights and liabilities. Who pays for what is the subject of the magazine's guide to Games funding. ## The infrastructure authority: the body that builds The Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority is the organisation a neighbour of a venue is most likely to meet before 2032. The authority dates itself to November 2024, and says it will deliver 17 new and upgraded venues: seven new and ten existing venues brought up to international standard. It also oversees two further venues that the City of Gold Coast is delivering. All of this sits inside a $7.1 billion program funded by the Australian and Queensland governments. Section 53AD of the Act gives the authority four main functions. For each "authority venue" listed in the Act's first schedule, it seeks funding allocations, delivers the venue in time for the Games and ensures compliance with the relevant Games agreements. It also monitors the delivery of other venues when the Minister directs it to in writing. "Delivery" is defined in section 5D as completing the detailed design and construction and making sure the venue is fit for its Games use. Which venues are on the list, and where, is covered in the magazine's venue plan guide. The 2025 amendments narrowed the authority's job. According to the explanatory notes to the Planning (Social Impact and Community Benefit) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025, the authority lost its earlier duties to write a transport and mobility strategy and a Games coordination plan, its planning powers and its power to acquire land. The authority's page lists a board of seven, chaired by Stephen Conry, who was appointed in November 2024, and a chief executive, Simon Crooks. Directors are nominated by the Minister, who may nominate only people who are appropriately qualified. Since the 2025 amendments the chief executive is appointed by the Minister after consulting the board, from a list the board recommends, and the Minister sets the pay and terms. Under section 53AI the head of the responsible department can ask the authority for information, inspections and attendance at meetings, and the authority must comply. The clearest example of the authority at work is Victoria Park in Brisbane. A statement from the Deputy Premier dated 17 July 2026 records that the authority took possession of the park on 1 June and appointed a contractor for early works on the stadium, with heavy earthworks from early August. ## The Games Leadership Group: where the bodies meet Section 55A of the Act, added in 2025, creates the Games Leadership Group to hold the whole picture. The explanatory notes describe its functions: to give strategic direction for the delivery of the Games and for compliance with the Olympic Host Contract, to help the Games entities decide things together, and to oversee and advise them. The Minister decides who sits on it, subject to a floor: at least one representative each of the Queensland Government, the Australian Government and Brisbane City Council. Introducing the bill on 1 May 2025, the Minister told Parliament the group would draw its members from the three levels of government, the authority and the organising committee, and that it was modelled on the Olympic board used for London 2012. The group builds and stages nothing. Its weight comes from two cross-references. The organising committee must have regard to its decisions under section 10, and the authority must have regard to its decisions and advice under section 53AE. ## Queensland ministers and departments The intergovernmental agreement describes Queensland as the signatory to the Olympic Host Contract, the underwriter of the Games and the greatest risk holder, mainly responsible for everything that does not fall to the organising committee. Several parts of the State Government carry that load. The Minister for Sport and Racing and Minister for the Olympic and Paralympic Games is the Minister most often meant when the Act speaks of the organising committee. Government statements of 30 July and 24 August 2026 were issued in that title by Tim Mander. The department behind the Minister, the Department of Sport, Racing and Olympic and Paralympic Games, houses the Olympic and Paralympic Games Office. The 2026-27 State Budget papers give the office 44 full-time equivalent staff and expenses of $27.2 million for the year, up from an estimated $17.0 million in 2025-26. Its stated role is to coordinate Games planning and delivery across the Queensland Government and the delivery partners, support the State as host contract signatory, administer parts of the Act and run the cross-partner governance. A government statement of 1 May 2025 said this department would prepare the Games Coordination Plan. The Deputy Premier, who is also Minister for State Development, Infrastructure and Planning, fronts the venue program: the July 2026 statement on the stadium's early works came from that office. The Department of Transport and Main Roads prepares the Transport and Mobility Strategy, according to the same May 2025 statement, a job that once sat with the authority. Other State-owned entities can be drawn in. Section 53EB of the Act lets the Minister direct government owned corporations and prescribed authorities to provide or maintain "necessary games infrastructure" so that venues, villages and Games-related transport are finished on time. The notes to the 2025 amendments say such directions are made jointly with the relevant ministers after consulting the entity's board, and that the entity bears the cost unless the direction says otherwise. ## The Australian Government: funder and guarantor Canberra is not a party to the Olympic Host Contract. The intergovernmental agreement, now in a version 2.0 dated 2025 and running until 5 September 2033, says so directly. The Commonwealth's part is to deliver the guarantees it gave the International Olympic Committee, to support the organising committee and the other Games bodies, and to share the cost of the venues and the transport program under separate funding schedules. The guarantees are the federal services no State can supply. Speaking to the International Olympic Committee's coordination commission during its 2025 visit, the federal Minister for Sport listed them as covering communications, national security, taxation, integrity, safety and safeguarding, and visa handling, delivered across several departments. Governance follows the money. The agreement says the Commonwealth and Queensland are to be fairly represented on the Games bodies, gives the Commonwealth equal standing with Queensland on the organising committee's vice president roles, and lets it suggest independent directors for the Queensland Minister to consider. Responsible ministers meet as needed and the agreement is reviewed every two years. ## Brisbane City Council and the other councils Three mayors each nominate a director to the organising committee's board: Brisbane, the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast. Brisbane City Council is guaranteed a representative on the Games Leadership Group, and its Lord Mayor chairs the councils advisory group. Brisbane City Council describes its own role as covering city activations, visitor services, traffic management, crowd movements, cleaning and waste services and local venue operations. It also counts Brisbane Metro among its own projects that serve the Games. The City of Gold Coast is delivering two venues itself, with the authority monitoring them. What councils have largely lost is the planning say. Under the Act as amended in 2025, development for the listed venues and villages is lawful without the usual approvals under planning and local government laws, a pathway explained in the magazine's guide to how venues get approved. A council's ordinary role as assessor of a development application does not apply to those sites, though village building work still needs a permit where the planning regulation would require one. ## The IOC, the AOC and Paralympics Australia The International Olympic Committee owns the Games and awarded them under the Olympic Host Contract. It watches through a coordination commission, a group of its members and specialists that meets the organisers at intervals and reports on progress. The commission met in Brisbane in May 2025. The Sports Examiner's report of that visit names Mikaela Cojuangco-Jaworski of the Philippines as its chair, succeeding Kirsty Coventry, who had been elected President of the International Olympic Committee, and the Associated Press report of 5 October 2026 still describes her as heading the commission. The commission has no power over a Queensland landowner or a council. Its leverage is contractual: the State and the organising committee have obligations under the host contract, and the Act repeatedly ties the local bodies to it. The organising committee must comply with the Olympic and Paralympic documents listed in section 10, and the Leadership Group's functions include compliance with the host contract. The Australian Olympic Committee and Paralympics Australia are the national arms of the two movements. Their influence runs through the organising committee's board, where the Act reserves seats for the Australian Olympic Committee's president and its honorary life president, the president of Paralympics Australia, the elected athlete directors, and any Australian who sits on the International Olympic Committee or on the governing board of the International Paralympic Committee. ## A venue, a road closure, a land acquisition: who to approach Three situations cover most of what an owner or tenant near a Games site will face.
Three common situations and where they sitGeneral position in October 2026; individual cases differ
SituationWho is responsibleWhat the Act says
Construction at a permanent venueThe infrastructure authority and its contractor, or the council delivering that venueThe authority delivers each authority venue and monitors others on direction.
A road closure or detourThe authority that controls the road, working with whoever is carrying out the works or the eventTransport strategy sits with Transport and Main Roads; councils handle local traffic.
A compulsory acquisitionA State body using general acquisition laws, not the infrastructure authorityThe authority's own acquisition power was removed in 2025.
**Works at a venue.** Noise, dust, truck routes, working hours and site access during construction are matters for whoever is delivering that venue. For the 17 authority venues that is the Games Independent Infrastructure and Coordination Authority, which runs a free 24-hour phone line and a subscriber list for updates on its projects. For a venue a council is delivering, it is the council. The organising committee becomes the right contact only for the overlay and the event period. One point limits what a neighbour can do through the courts. The notes to the 2025 amendments explain that section 53DD of the Act bars civil proceedings that have a reasonable prospect of preventing the timely delivery of a venue or village, and that section 53EG makes the relevant decisions final, open to review only for jurisdictional error. **Road closures.** A closure has two parts: who needs it and who controls the road. During construction the need comes from the venue's builder. At Games time it will come from the organising committee's event plans. Control depends on whether the road is the State's or the council's. Brisbane City Council lists traffic management and crowd movement among its Games tasks, and the Department of Transport and Main Roads holds the Transport and Mobility Strategy. **Land acquisition.** Here the 2025 changes matter most.
Land

The infrastructure authority no longer has its own power to resume land

The 2024 version of the Act let a regulation declare "acquisition land" for a venue or village and treated the authority as the acquiring body. The 2025 amendments removed that power, the explanatory notes say, because existing powers such as those in the State Development and Public Works Organisation Act 1971 were considered sufficient.

Any compulsory acquisition for a Games project would therefore come under Queensland's general laws. The 1971 Act is the statute under which the Coordinator-General operates. The Acquisition of Land Act 1967, which the 2024 notes referred to for its objection and compensation processes, is the general framework for a taking of land in Queensland. An owner who receives a notice should read which Act and which acquiring body it names, because the steps, time limits and compensation rights flow from that Act. How those rights apply to one property is a question for a lawyer. ## How the arrangement has changed since 2021 The structure a resident meets today has been rebuilt twice since 2021, in 2024 and in 2025, which is why older articles and some government pages describe bodies or board seats that no longer exist.
Five steps to the current structure
  1. July 2021The International Olympic Committee awards the Games to Brisbane, and Queensland passes the Arrangements Act later that year.
  2. 2024A separate venue authority is legislated, with its own board; the present authority dates itself to November.
  3. 2025The authority is narrowed to delivery, the Leadership Group is created and the committee's board is cut from 24 to 15.
  4. June 2026The authority takes possession of Victoria Park and early works on the stadium follow.
  5. After 2032A regulation sets a dissolution day and the State succeeds the organising committee.
A document dated before mid-2025 may therefore describe an authority with planning and land powers it no longer has, or board seats that have been abolished. The Act on the Queensland legislation register and the bodies' own current pages show the present position. > One body stages the Games and another builds for them. Knowing which one is on the other side of the fence is half of getting an answer.