Despite this, despite my ability to enjoy literally any sport (apart from test cricket – and that’s not an Olympic sport), I am offended, gobsmacked and darn right outraged by David Cameron’s personal decision to double the budget for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympic and Paralympic games. I don’t care that it’s coming from within ‘the Olympic envelope’. It’s still public money.
I’ve watched every Olympics I’ve been alive for. As a nine year old I go up in the middle of the night to watch live as Daley Thompson (summer) and Torville & Dean (Winter) won Olympic gold for Britain and celebrated as I watch Linford Christie win in Barcelona. I watched us fail spectacularly in Sydney. The smile across Kelly Holmes face as she crossed the finishing line to complete the middle distance double in Athens in 2004 is an image that will long live in the memory. But I don’t remember the opening ceremonies. I just don’t. Even my abiding memory of Beijing is Boris the Buffoon at the closing ceremony, rather than the opening ceremony – which I’ll admit was pretty amazing.
But £41m extra on a glorified party that the vast majority of taxpayers won’t get to enjoy – when the budget was already £40m – is obscene. It’s banker extravagance obscene in the current climate. Particularly if the NAO is right and there’s a real risk of the Olympics going over budget.
To put £41m in context, it’s ten per cent of the total amount of money that Grant Shapps allocated to social housing investment just a couple of weeks ago. It’s close to the entire amount Camden is cutting from front line services in three years – including play, and luncheon clubs and freedom passes to help mental health patients find work. As a one off investment it could rebuild or refurbish some of the schools that didn’t get their BSF funding. It would pay for the gap in funding for the Olympic Impacts on Camden that Boris is forcing our taxpayers to pick up 68 times over.
Instead the government, David Cameron personally in fact, has decided this money is best spent on a few hours of entertainment that only a few very lucky, and a few very rich, people will get to see first-hand. This at a time when councils have been forced to cancel bonfire night fireworks and spending on other community events and festivals. And at a time that if we did spend it we’d probably be pilloried by government for spending on unnecessary extravagances.
I support the Olympics wholeheartedly. I support the festival of sport. I support the regeneration of east London. I support London hosting the games. But doubling a budget for a party that already stood at £40m is nothing more than gross overspending. It should be put back in the pot to prevent other cost overruns or invested in tangible benefits in the form of the Olympic Legacy.
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