Examination of witness (Questions 100
- 112)
TUESDAY 18 JANUARY 2000
MR TONY
BANKS
100. Finally, we have heard from several witnesses
that the way in which sport is currently administered is a muddle
and a mess and does not give us that best performance overseas
and does not look good. Under the constitutional changes that
we have made since we came to Government, you were the Minister
for English sport?
(Mr Banks) Yes.
101. Now, looking back, what would your recommendations
be to Government as to what the Sports Minister should be?
(Mr Banks) Someone perhaps with more direct authority.
The Sports Minister has to deal with a large number of other bodies
and other Government departments. I have made this quite clear
in all of the evidence I have given. It is a role that has an
influence and, depending on how well the job is done, can have
a significant influence on sport. We allow the decisions to be
taken by other bodies. When it comes round to major projects like
this I think the arm's length principle starts to come under critical
examination. As in other countries—Australia is one of them—it
is advisable for the Government to take things over. If this is
national then for God's sake why does the Government not take
it over? I have made this clear and I have said it on the floor
of the House, that if it is a national stadium it ought to be
the Government that does it. I am a great believe in the grand
projet approach. The French for all their faults, and as we
know they have many, have a way of dealing with this, although
as we heard the Stade de France did run into difficulties. The
one thing that I deeply regret about this is not that it has affected
the 2006 World Cup bid, because it has not, but what it said about
the culture of decision-making in this country and what it said
about the Government's attitude to these sorts of things. We continually
whinge about things happening or not happening. Until we take
charge of great projects like this we can hardly start turning
around and blaming somebody else.
Derek Wyatt: But we did have charge of
the Dome.
Miss Kirkbride
102. Mr Banks, you have partially answered the
question I wanted to ask you in your last response to Mr Wyatt.
Following when you left in July of last year and the decision
that has now been taken not to pursue the dual purpose stadium,
can you speculate and outline for me what you think happened that
changed that decision and who might have been involved?
(Mr Banks) I can endlessly speculate but I am not
sure that would be of any use. I usually leave that to the press.
It does seem to me that there is more in this, and I come back
to my starting point, that I can perceive and maybe up until now
that the Committee can perceive. I do not know to be perfectly
honest, I do not know. I made one suggestion that the BOA decided,
because obviously they were not throwing their medals in the air
on 29 July, to issue a generally supportive press statement, which
you have seen no doubt, of the Wembley design and then perhaps
thought that with the change of personnel it was worth opening
up again. That was where I became concerned because there could
be cost factors in this, for example the warm-up track. Looking
at the Olympic Games what Government has to realise is that it
is not just a question of Wembley Stadium, one stadium for the
opening and closing event and athletics, it requires an enormous
amount of investment. Perhaps the Government ought to be asked
whether they still support London bidding for a future Olympic
Games because it is an enormously costly exercise. This is one
thing that you cannot move off to the Lottery. This is something
that would require considerable Exchequer funding because of the
development of the whole Wembley area. I said in the adjournment
debate on 29 June that it is not just about building a new national
stadium, it is about redeveloping the whole area around Wembley.
You cannot just put a new national stadium into that mess which
is Wembley at the moment. That is why a special Wembley Taskforce
was set up in order to try to generate income for the redevelopment
of the whole area. I believe there are enough resources in the
Wembley area generally, commercial resources, that could unlock
the value of that whole area in order to develop a fine national
stadium which could be the centrepiece of an Olympic Games, plus
all the ancillary things you need like a warm-up track. That requires
commitment and it requires commitment from Government.
103. I know you are a London MP but if there
is going to be a separate athletics stadium where should that
be sited? Why do you think that it should be in London and not
in one of the other regions?
(Mr Banks) Unfortunately what happens is that a number
of non-London Members get very edgy and uppity when people stand
up and they happen to be a London Member, and at the same time
a Sports Minister, saying "it has got to be London".
Effectively these are the requirements of the international governing
bodies. They want to come to London, that is the point. With the
country being small, unlike huge continents like the United States,
London is the obvious place for them to go when it comes round
to things like the Olympic Games. Primo Nebiolo wanted Wembley
and, Mr Wyatt was absolutely right, he wanted to get into Wembley
before anyone else got into Wembley. This would be a great tribute
to athletics, to the IAAF and to Primo Nebiolo. I was quite happy
to go along with that because I thought that it would be great
for London as well as for sports and athletics in this country.
I do not care whether it is massaging someone's ego, I will massage
his ego or almost any other part of the anatomy. The fact is they
want to come to London. Manchester was put forward so was Birmingham,
but they did not want to know. I know that it can be offensive
to non-London Members to hear this but they want London because
it is the capital city. It is not just about the sports event
itself, it is all the other ancillary things, they want to come
to London because they want to shop, they want to see the sights,
they want to go to shows and maybe, who knows, other nefarious
practices which London can offer in legion. The fact is they want
London. If we are talking about an Olympic Games it has got to
be London. Given the problems that UK Athletics had, and I feel
for them more than anybody else at this moment, they really have
been knocked all over the place. I went to see Primo Nebiolo to
get the decision date changed. I lobbied personally in order to
try to get athletics at Wembley and the World Athletics Championships,
as David Moorcroft knows. The fact is they want London and although
it might be possible for the World Athletics Championships to
go to Manchester, I think it will in many ways, take the gilt
off the gingerbread. If Mr Moorcroft and his colleagues have got
to go to the IAAF and say "I am afraid it is not going to
be the new Wembley we promised for this major international event,
it is going to be Manchester". I think that will undoubtedly
make the bid that much less attractive to the IAAF.
Mrs Organ
104. Of course, as Mr Banks knows because he
has visited that part of the world, I do not understand why they
do not want to go to the Forest of Dean. Can I go back to a few
detailed questions about the National Stadium Monitoring Committee.
I will be very quick about it. I am interested in this because
at the point that the design was shown and everybody thought we
had got the compromise, people felt that it needed to be looked
at a little more carefully. I wonder if you could tell me, because
you said the Government Office for London was there, the FA, the
English Sports Council, who chaired those meetings?
(Mr Banks) Effectively the Secretary of State if we
had a meeting with the Secretary of State. Discussions would have
taken place between officials but in terms of formal meetings
it would have been the Secretary of State.
105. Whose decision was it to set up the Monitoring
Committee?
(Mr Banks) It is difficult to answer that question.
It was definitely a political decision. It was definitely Ministers
who took the decision. If I remember rightly it might very well
have been a proposal that I put. Why not, let me claim the genesis
of the idea. Certainly I felt that it was something we needed
to have. Of course, we needed to have it as soon as we got hold
of Wembley and, as I said, we did not effectively get hold of
Wembley until the beginning of 1999.
106. Who made the decision who should be on
the Committee and, therefore, that BOA and UK Athletics were not
to be involved in this Monitoring Committee?
(Mr Banks) That question I cannot answer because I
cannot recall. I know the membership of the Committee now but
I cannot recall.
Mrs Organ: We have asked for the possibility
of the minutes of this Committee, is that right, Chairman?
Chairman
107. That is something that is up to the Secretary
of State.
(Mr Banks) I am not prevaricating, Chairman, if I
could remember I would certainly answer the Committee honestly
but on this occasion I am afraid my memory is at fault.
108. Obviously we accept entirely what you say,
Mr Banks, but I do have to make clear that there was one occasion
when Mr Smith, of his own volition, decided to make available
to us an internal minute from the Department. It was in fact—forgive
me for mentioning it—over the Royal Opera House. It is entirely
up to the Government as to whether they supply that kind of information
to a Select Committee. We cannot require it in any way.
(Mr Banks) Perhaps it can be placed on the record
that I would certainly hope that the Department would make those
minutes or any other papers available to the Committee. In my
opinion this is not a matter of, as it were, pointing the finger
and apportioning blame, it is a question of trying to resolve
how the situation came about and trying to ensure that it never
comes about again. That is obviously what we are all trying to
do. I would hope that those minutes would be provided unless they
have some clear commercial confidentiality involved in them, they
certainly cannot be state secrets.
Mrs Organ
109. Lastly, you mentioned about the importance
of Government taking the thing by the horns and actually having
a real role and a function in big events like this. When we look
at what happens in Australia and France, does government put money
in?
(Mr Banks) Yes. The States put money in in Australia.
In fact, they compete amongst themselves and government certainly
puts money in. I think in France that money is raised through
bonds and loans and various other things and no doubt the City
of Paris will be paying off the bill for some considerable time
to come. That is something we have mentioned before in this Committee,
if not on the floor of the House, that a future Mayor of London
will be very much involved in something like this because given
the amounts of commercial benefit to a city like London it is
quite right that the London government should, as it were, if
not support financially certainly be prepared to assist in raising
finance to fund things like the Olympic Games. I suspect that
is exactly what will happen when we come round to getting a bid
hopefully for the future Olympic Games in London. Personally I
would very much support the idea of having a designated Minister
when you have a project of this significance who could be put
solely in charge. I might add that it does help both to concentrate
the mind and also to avoid all the other distractions that come
when you have a project which is only one part of your portfolio,
however big that project might be, because there are so many other
things to which you also have to attend. As you know, in politics
you are very rarely given the benefit of the doubt. If you cannot
do something they will assume that you do not want to do it, not
that you are busy doing something else.
Mr Faber
110. I am sorry to come back again but there
was just one thing that you said, Mr Banks, subsequent to when
I was questioning you. You were talking about the £20 million
that could possibly be returned to athletics. It has always been
assumed that money would come from Wembley National Stadium or
from the FA but you chose your words very carefully and you said
"from football in general". Are you suggesting that
it might come from any sources of football?
(Mr Banks) Obviously it could. The obvious candidate
would be the Premier League.
111. Why on earth would the Premier League want
to spend £20 million?
(Mr Banks) Because they are wealthier than the Football
Association. A number of the individuals are synonymous to both
organisations. It could very well be that it is the Premier League,
I do not know. That may very well be the situation. Words have
been chosen carefully and I have seen that football would contribute,
not the Football Association but football. Who knows, this is
something that the Select Committee might want to look at. It
might be that the Football Association has said that the money
will be paid out of the revenue stream coming from the new national
stadium—
112. I think given the scrutiny that football
in general is under, given the reports of a Government Taskforce
and possible proposals for a Government regulator on that Taskforce,
I think it is probably very significant if the Premier League
are willing to pay £20 million for something that was not
their responsibility in the first place.
(Mr Banks) I would not wish to comment on that, Mr
Faber.
Chairman: Since we have got Mr Banks
making the historic statement that he will not comment, I think
this would be an appropriate point at which to end the meeting.
We would like to thank you very much indeed.
|
