InfrastructureTaryn ParisTue 15 Sep 26
Hidden Risk Building Behind Queensland’s Olympic Boom
Queensland’s construction sector isn’t just facing a demand problem.
According to Build Skills Australia general manager, research and strategy Robert Sobyra, it’s caught in a pincer—and both sides are closing.
“It’s not only a demand side picture here,” Sobyra says on the latest episode of our Blueprint podcast series. “Sure, you can talk about the pipeline quadrupling—but the supply side has been challenged as well.”
The numbers back him up. In the three years prior to the pandemic, building costs rose about 3 per cent. In the three years after, they jumped 30 per cent—and haven’t stopped climbing.
Then there’s the Olympics. Sobyra says the spin-off investment expected to flow from the 2032 Games is the part of the picture that worries him most—and his modelling isn’t painting a comfortable picture.
In the podcast, Sobyra outlines the sectors that will feel the pinch during the lead-up to the Games, with one sector likely to shoulder the brunt of it.
As Olympic-linked infrastructure ramps up, he expects labour to be pulled straight from those projects and onto higher-paying Games-adjacent work.
It’s the start of what Sobyra frames as an arms race for labour; developers, contractors and government-backed projects all competing for the same shrinking pool of trades. And arms races have a cost; as demand for workers outstrips supply, wages climb, and that gets built straight back into the price of every project competing for the same crews.
The full conversation—including how developers should be positioning now—is on Blueprint, available now on Apple Music, YouTube or Spotify.
