Examination of Witnesses (Questions 140
- 159)
WEDNESDAY 15 JANUARY 2003
RT HON
TESSA JOWELL,
MP, RT HON
RICHARD CABORN,
MP AND MR
ROBERT RAINE
Mr Wyatt
140. Good morning. I wonder if I could look
at the cost side and discuss the Treasury's input here? With the
Treasury, has there been an analysis of what is required for the
East End of London in terms of the regeneration, and a costing
of what that is irrespective of an Olympic bid, and if so what
are the figures?
(Tessa Jowell) Yes. Mr Wyatt, you will be aware of
the discussions within Government which are being chaired by the
Prime Minister to consider the proposal for the development of
the Thames Gateway of which the Olympic site is a small part,
so yes, the discussions are within that broader context.
141. Do we know the figures yet?
(Tessa Jowell) The figures are in the process of development,
and clearly the conclusion on the figures will be one of the factors
in determining whether to proceed.
142. I raised this in the House yesterday but
the Chancellor of the Exchequer had a Doomsday Book created in
July 1997 of all the assets that the UK owns, and if we are concerned
as a Government that we do not want to foist a London bid on the
taxpayer what analysis has been done on what we do own in the
Doomsday Book? For instance, taking one particular example, we
talked and then put back and then opened the privatisation of
Channel 4, which in today's terms might be worth between £750
million and £1 billion, and presumably there are 10, 12,
15 jewels like that in the Doomsday book. What analysis have we
done of what that Doomsday Book has in it so that, if we have
to find £5 billion or £7 billion, we could at least
look at that Book.
(Tessa Jowell) Let me begin by saying that we have
had an enormous amount of help from the Treasury in the work we
are doing on the figures in relation to this and a Treasury official
was an observer on the Arup group which developed the first figures
and we have had a lot of Treasury assistance in helping refine
and develop those figures. On your question about Channel 4, let
me make absolutely clear that we have as a Government a manifesto
commitment that we will not sell Channel 4 and we are not looking
to sell existing assets in order to finance an Olympic Games.
We are looking at the available sources of public income in the
broadest possible sense. However, we have to accept that at the
end of the day the provider of last resort is the taxpayer and
that is why we are looking at this very much in the context of
this underwriting of an Olympic bid and as being potentially a
major public expenditure commitment that would have to be set
alongside the commitment to building new hospitals, new schools
and so forth, all the priorities that our Government was elected
to deliver.
143. I understand on Friday you will be visiting
the President of the IOC and having a discussion with him. I wonder
if you could let us know what sorts of things you will be discussing.
Let me try and tease some things from you. Some of us believe
that the Olympics has been a fairly corrupt organisation. I remember
making a film of David Jenkins and the drug abuse that existed
in the American and British teams in 1988 for Channel 4, so I
have some personal experience of the corruption that existed at
the time in the IOC. To what extent do you feel that the IOC is
now clean and there is no disruption, and to what extent do you
feel the bidding process is clean and there is no corruption?
(Tessa Jowell) I think Jacques Rogge has seen it as
his priority as President of the IOC to address directly all those
allegations and facts about corrupt behaviour in the past and
he has made that very clearly his mission as President and I know
that Richard, who has had a number of discussions with him, has
made that absolutely clear. When I see him on Friday I want to
establish the degree of transparency in the bidding process. It
will never be, as I have said before, an exact science, but I
want to get a better assessment than I currently have at the moment
about the standing of the UK, the standing of London in Olympic
circles and what probability we could put on actually winning
a bid. I think at the moment the collective assessment within
Government and in consultation with the key sporting bodies would
be put at one in three or one in four. That is very simple. We
expect that Paris, a German city and a Spanish city, Madrid or
Seville, are likely to bid, so that gives us a one in three or
one in four chance. There appears to be no overriding obstacle
to a London bid. I think the feeling is that a London bid would
be a technically strong bid. We know the judgments about Olympic
winners are not made only on the technical strength of the bid,
it is to elaborate the context in which those decisions will be
taken and the factors that will be taken into account that I want
to discuss with the President on Friday.
144. Can I take up some of Frank Doran's questioning.
If the Cabinet agrees to going forward, is there any mad rush
for this 30 January deadline? In other words, is the gun to your
head so that you have to make this decision or could the Government
say there are some problems with the figures, we have not had
enough time between now and the thirtieth, we would like to look
at another bid, say in North Kent, but we actually need more time?
Could we say on the thirtieth we are going to tick it, we understand
the public are behind it, but, to be honest, we need a little
bit more time? Could we tick it in January and then decide not
to formally apply in June? Secondly, you gave some thought about
what you might be saying after the decision, if it was a tick.
Is there going to be an Olympic Department? Is there going to
be a Minister for the Olympics in the Cabinet Office? What is
your current thinking on that?
(Tessa Jowell) Perhaps I could take the third question
in your list of questions, Mr Wyatt. An Olympic bid will be a
bid to host the Olympics in London rather than North Kent or anywhere
else in the country and I think that that is absolutely clear.
The end of January is an important deadline because the British
Olympic Association have made clear that they will need time to
prepare a bid, that they will be the bidding organisation, but
as Jacques Rogge and everybody recognises, a bid can only proceed
if it has the wholehearted support of the Government. We have
made clear that we will do it by then. As you know, there is a
tremendous amount of work to be done and the work is still in
progress in order to meet that deadline, but no, I do not think
it would be right to say we need more time. We have said for a
long time that we will give a decision by the end of January and
it is my intention that we meet that deadline. In relation to
if we decide to bid, what then happens: I really do not have anything
further to add to my answer to Frank Doran's question, which is
that we would make an announcement a few weeks after about how
the process of bidding would be organised within and beyond Government.
John Thurso
145. Can I first of all ask a simple factual
question regarding accommodation. I think you said there would
be a net increase in visitors of 300,000, which I presume is visitors
and not visitor nights. Do we have that accommodation and, if
not, how much needs to be built?
(Tessa Jowell) Yes, we do and it is because of London's
hotel capacity and particularly its upper end of the range hotel
capacity that London is in fact the only city that the BOA considers
to be credible to host the Games.
146. So we do not need to build any more accommodation
in hotel terms other than the village?
(Tessa Jowell) No, although I think if you have been
out to Stratford lately you will see that there are a lot of hotel
developments going on there. We do not need more hotel development.
That does not mean to say there will not be more hotel development.
147. Can I come back to the question of costs
and benefits and I must commend you on the work that has been
done on the costs. It does seem to me that there were rather wobbly
costs which the Arup Report started with, but you have probably
flushed out many of the problems that might have come in the future,
so the £2.6 billion is probably a pretty robust figure. The
other thing is the table comparative to the other Games which
is very useful. What have you done to compare the benefits that
past Games have been able to have in the same way and what assessment
have you made of the quality of those benefits?
(Mr Caborn) We have done that from the visits we have
made. It is very difficult to compare like with like here. We
are talking about the Sydney Games and there was a major motorway
built from the airport to the Games village which was not costed
into the cost of the Games. I think there are several benefits
that we will look at. First of all, you want to make sure that
you use the bidding stage very effectively, but you must have
an exit strategy in the event of you not winning the bid. You
can actually gain quite a lot out of that. If one looks at what
Manchester and Birmingham did on their bids, they actually gained
out of the bidding process. I think it is an approach that you
can have to the whole bidding process. Beyond that then obviously
there is delivering. Again, everybody stressed to us very clearly
that we will want to make sure the bidding process time is actually
used as a potential part of delivery as well. I think the problem
that Athens has now is they lost out for three years in the bidding
process and it has now cost them very dearly indeed because to
some extent they are in crisis management and therefore they are
paying premiums on much of the construction. In terms of the legacy,
then what has been stressed to us is to make sure you use the
facilities that you have already to the maximum and Sydney wish
they had done that because there are now two areas competing with
each other. The very important point is to make sure that your
strategy is actually in place before you start and that is part
of the bidding process as well, so you know what you are going
to do with your facilities. For example, Sydney are paying £10
million a year in revenue charges, that is revenue not capital,
for keeping their facilities going. You have hockey and tennis,
which are massively under-utilized, which they believe and wish
they had got an alternative use for, which could have been done
as a strategy when they were designing the building. We have learned
a lot from that. Therefore, I believe if we did bid then our exit
strategy would be as cost-effective as possible, in fact probably
better than any other Olympics before. I think the Manchester
one was an experience in terms of being able to have a reasonable
exit strategy and how you would bring Manchester City into that
stadium. They were criticised immediately after the Games when
they were going to rip up the track and dig six foot deeper to
get 10,000 more seats in there. When you lift the revenue implications
off the back of a city or a country it is worth considering. Bayern
Munich are now coming out of the Munich stadium after many years
of playing there because of a dispute with the architect and it
is going to cost Munich city £6 million a year revenue to
keep that stadium as it is now. Bayern Munich will move out in
about the next six months.
148. It seems to me from the evidence we received
yesterday that it is an absolute prerequisite of any attempt to
make a bid that the Government is totally behind it, not just
ticking the boxes but absolutely full-bloodedly behind it and
I think from the evidence you have given you have indicated that
that will be the Government's position. There was also clearly
very strong public support probably based on the feel good factor.
The mood of music over the last 24 hours has been very much about
costs and is it worth it and could not we get it all in a different
way. Putting it into perspective, the cost is about three-quarters
of the costs of, for example, decommissioning a nuclear reactor.
So it depends on how up choose to look at it. Do we not really
need to say that this should not be about puritanical cost management,
this really should be about Britain going out for a flagship event
and just standing up and saying we are going to do this, we have
made the best estimate of cost, it is pretty robust, it is worth
it, let us get on with it?
(Tessa Jowell) That may well be the conclusion that
we reach, but it has to be a conclusion which is rooted in an
understanding of the choices, that it is a choice between doing
this and putting more money into hospitals, putting more money
into schools, putting more money into transport, putting more
money into more grass-roots sport, putting more money into getting
more children playing more sport at school. You cannot ever retreat
from the choices that you have to make and this is precisely the
purpose of the debate that we have tried to create. In a sense
let us go for it and let us go for it because we are a proud nation
and we are going to showcase London and our athletes are going
to win more medals than ever before. That is why you do it, but
that is the easy bit. The hard bit, as the experience of the Commonwealth
Games has shown, the experience of Picketts Lock has shown, the
experience of Wembley has shown, is that it is very easy to be
driven by euphoria alone and then the hard reckoning follows afterwards
and that is what we want to avoid, so that we say to people, if
we decide to bid, yes, we have decided because, in full understanding
of the consequences, this is such a great thing for Britain and
if we do not bid it will be because we have decided after rigorous
examination that the costs are just too great and other very precious
priorities, not just of the Government but of people up and down
the country, would have to suffer if we were to do this. I think
the poll, which I hope you got in good time, that we commissioned
showed some very interesting conclusions. Yes, people are overwhelmingly
in favour of our making a bid. The numbers fall when people are
pressed in committing themselves to that alongside the consequences.
There is one very interesting chart in the polling evidence which
shows that, from memory, if you tell somebody they have £100,
overwhelmingly what the sample showed was that you spend the largest
slug of your money on more schools, the next largest slug on more
hospitals, the next largest slug on increasing the value of pensions
and then, interestingly, above reducing taxes, you spend money
on an Olympic bid. I think the public's priorities are very clear
indeed, but nobody should believe that hosting the Olympics would
be somehow a free good, that we can just decide to do it as a
decision that is divorced from the costs, the costs for sport,
the costs for transport and all our commitments to public service
renewal.
149. So ultimately the Chancellor will decide?
(Tessa Jowell) No, the Chancellor will not decide,
the Government will decide and the Government will decide because
right across Government there is a passion for sport and investment
in sport which the Chancellor shares. Look at the money that we
won for sport in the last spending round, building on investment
in sport in the previous spending round. The investment in sport
from the Exchequer has more than doubled in the last five years,
so across Government there is a passion about sport, the good
that it can bring and the sense of national pride that it can
generate, but that is very realistically set alongside our commitments
to other areas of public service investment as well.
Alan Keen
150. Can I just ask about one issue and say
a few words to put it into context. I asked Steve Redgrave yesterday
about the value of the Olympic village and he said that it is
everything. He said it means such a lot to the athletes to live
in one village. On the other hand, the alternative to that, I
reckon, and maybe you can help, that it must cost £½
billion in order to have 18,000 athletes living in a village for
three weeks, the alternative is to spread it around the country.
Steve said you could have what would be like a world championships
where it is spread around the country rather than have 18,000
athletes living in one village. Because we want them all to live
in one village for three weeks and to build a stadium, it is going
to cost what, £300 million at least, and then it would be
handed over or given to a football club which maybe does not even
want it. We perhaps could save £½ billion, and as you
are going to see the IOC on Friday, it is an ideal time to talk
about it, but we could save £½ billion by having the
events spread around the country and we would not then have to
build the stadium because we could have the athletics in Wembley
Stadium, for instance, and £18 million is the last estimate
we have had to put in the metal framing to reduce the seating
and make an area big enough for athletics. We have already given
£20 million to the FA which you cannot take back from them
now. We have given £20 million in order to make it compatible
for athletics, and events could also be held around the whole
country and we would save £½ billion. If you said to
the athletes, "Look, instead of living in a village, we could
give you £27,000 each", that would still come to £½
billion, which is a lot of money, so it is costing every nation
every four years and it is costing taxpayers and kids who would
get that money for sports equipment and facilities, and I reckon
it is at least £½ billion we would save by spreading
it around the country and this is every four years. Because the
IOC is such an undemocratic organisation, nobody can put these
points and they do not have to answer to anybody. You are going
to see them on Friday and you are not in a position to say, "Look,
I think you should do this", because if you take a hard line,
they are going to say, "Right, you might as well not even
bid because you are not getting the Games". It is an undemocratic
organisation, so it is hard to get these changes put forward,
so I think you have a job, but I hope you will try to convince
me that it is not costing us £½ billion.
(Tessa Jowell) Let me deal, first of all, with the
costs of the Olympic village which Arup estimate to be at about
£62 million and obviously there would have to be some conversion
of the accommodation from single-person accommodation for the
athletes to family housing which would provide the 4,000 homes
legacy afterwards. I think you have asked an interesting question,
Mr Keen, but it is in direct conflict with the IOC's own standards
and obviously touches on our assessment of whether or not we could
win. I think it would be highly desirable to disperse facilities
in different parts of the country in order that the country as
a whole could benefit from what will otherwise be an event which
will largely benefit, particularly in relation to tourist numbers,
the economy of London. There are ways in which we would expect
to be able to do that through the development of training facilities
in different parts of the country, for instance, before the Olympics
themselves start. The athletes will come well ahead of time in
order to acclimatise and to train and certainly it would be possible,
it would be a requirement to have training camps in different
parts of the country and some of the facilities will be dispersed.
Shooting will be at Bisley as it was for the Commonwealth Games
and so forth, and football would be held in stadia around the
country. The IOC are quite clear that it is a city that bids to
host the Games and they do not create the degree of latitude that
you might want or that we might think is also desirable.
151. That is why I said as part of the question
that it is difficult for us, the UK, to go to the IOC and say,
"Why don't you do this?", but if we do not do it now,
if things are going to be perpetuated over another century, and
you mentioned straightaway in your answer about the cost of the
village, though it is not the accommodation of the village that
I am talking about, but having to build a major stadium which
is not going to be needed afterwards and having to put swimming
pools in places and then having to dismantle them again afterwards,
the overall cost of having to build a stadium and all the associated
accommodation and everything else that goes with it. What I am
saying is that I would like you to calculate how much cheaper
it would be if we used stadia that are already around the country
because I think it is something which, even if we do not put it
to the IOC on Friday, which might damage our ability to win the
bid, we should put it to them at some point. With an undemocratic
organisation like it is, it is very hard for anybody to bring
about any changes. As I said in the debate, I love the Olympics,
so I am not criticising the Olympics, but it is just that it must
cost £½ billion at least to get all of that stuff in
one area and it just seems an awful lot to pay when it could be
spread around the country and more people could enjoy it. That
£½ billion at least, or £27,000 per athlete, seems
an awful lot just to get the athletes together in one village
for three weeks when one billion people or more are going to watch
it on television and enjoy it. That is the real question I am
asking.
(Mr Caborn) I think that Rogge is very mindful of
the point that you make and he has discussed with a number of
people how you can actually contain and indeed to some extent
downsize the Olympics because it is growing at a rate and has
been, some would say, over-commercialised and indeed it has taken
it out of the price tag for many nations to run now and I think
the IOC and particularly Rogge are mindful of that and are looking
at how they can bring it into manageable proportions so that other
nations can actually run that. I think, therefore, that any of
those suggestions which are put forward, he would be exploring
those. The debate a few weeks ago in the IOC was about the number
of events and there was obviously a bit of consternation from
those who are not likely to be in the bid for the Games in 2012.
I think on the question of the village, it is an important one.
It is one that we had a lot of discussion about when we ran the
Commonwealth Games. There is a question of security, first of
all, which we all know from Munich and that has to be a consideration.
Secondly, I think there is a desire of the athletes to actually
live together and the camaraderie of the Olympics, I think, is
an important part and if you have ever been into one of these
villages, they are fantastic. I have had the opportunity of visiting
two or three of them. Also it can be used very effectively in
the exit strategy. If you look at what has happened, for example,
in Sydney, half of that is now a campus and they use it very creatively.
They use the press, which was again a very big construction in
Sydney for the Games there, they have actually used that facility
to turn it over now into the sports science and medicine part
of the university and they use the housing as part of the campus,
so they knew exactly what they were going to do with that and
you can see that in a number of other areas. Universities in London
are short of both accommodation and facilities, so there are ways
that we can look at that. Again in Manchester, we coupled with
the university there to look at the swimming complex, so there
are lots of crossovers here that you can use. It is obviously
an expenditure, but it can also be a major asset in the exit strategy
if it is used creatively.
Miss Kirkbride
152. Secretary of State, listening to you yesterday
and this morning, I think most people would all agree that some
big baths of cold water have been poured over Britain's Olympic
aspirations really. I wonder if you could put more of a case as
to why it might be a good idea. First of all, it was in the Labour
Party Manifesto in 1997 that you would bring the Olympics to Britain,
so what has changed?
(Tessa Jowell) Well, I am not pouring a bath of cold
water over this at all, but I am doing what I think it is my job
to do. The Secretary of State's job to do is not to walk the country
into an unfunded commitment or into a huge commitment, the funding
of which would reduce our ability to meet our commitments in other
areas of public spending. I think that, as I have said, the polling
that we have published today shows very clearly where the public
are on this. Making the case for the Olympics is the easy bit.
Of course there is a case for sport which has been made by ministers
across government, but this also comes with very heavy costs and
I would say to you that this Select Committee has taken a very
trenchant view of the handling of big projects by Government,
including projects by my Department, and you have been highly
critical in the past about the failure to take account of the
true cost and the true burden on government. I take that very
seriously indeed. The Minister for Sport takes that very seriously
indeed. My Permanent Secretary and the officials of my Department
take that very seriously indeed. Therefore, in exposing the costs
of an Olympic bid and the choices that are involved in deciding
to go ahead with an Olympic bid, I am doing my job not just for
sport, but for the other investments that we in this Government
hold very dear indeed on behalf of the people of this country
who have elected us to deliver them.
153. But other countries which are known to
us who have had the Olympics, with the exception of America, have
a smaller GNP than we have. They also have the same priorities
for their populations, Australia and Spain both have the same
priorities for their populations, yet they can afford them. We
are the fourth largest economy in the world and you are very much
giving the impression that we cannot afford them.
(Tessa Jowell) No, I am not saying that. The Games
are affordable. They are affordable if we decide we are not going
to do other things. Those who are directly involved in sport have
made it very clear that they would not, for instance, want the
price of the Olympics to be reducing our commitment to grassroots
sport, reducing our commitment to sport in schools, reducing our
commitment to elite sport, so you have to accept that there are
choices. There is not a cache of money which is available cost-free
from any of these choices and available to spend on the Olympics.
It is money from the taxpayer or certainly it is money which is
underwritten by the taxpayer. We will obviously look, we are looking
at the extent that we might be able to use Lottery income in order
to contribute to this and a number of other options are currently
being explored, but at the end of the day, taking the most cautious
scenario, we have to be prepared to say that we want this so much
that we are prepared for the taxpayer to underwrite it and we
want it so much that we are prepared to make choices between other
priorities. Otherwise, it is simply not a decision that has been
taken in the real world and in relation to your—
154. I am sorry, Chairman, but we do not have
very long and if the Secretary of State makes very long answers,
then we do not get a chance to put other questions to her. One
cannot help but wonder, though, when talking about schools and
hospitals, that it is just a good way of warming up the general
public to the disappointment of the Government saying, "No,
we are not having the courage and the aspiration for an Olympic
bid". The truth is that the Government spends something like
£400 billion every year and we are talking about a project
10 years away and yes, I do accept that £4.5 billion, at
the top end of what it might be, is a lot of money, but, goodness
me, we are going to earn a lot of money in the meantime and if
we want to go to the theatre, we have to pay for the ticket, do
we not? If Britain wants to host the Olympics, if we want to let
our domestic population come here and see the Olympics, then there
is a price to be paid, but are you really saying that there are
so many schools and hospitals which are not going to be built
as a result of that? It does not seem credible when we spend £400
billion every year under your Government.
(Tessa Jowell) The facts are there. If we spend £2.5
billion from public money on the Olympics for all the reasons
that we have been discussing this morning, all the positive reasons,
then that is £2.5 billion that will not be spent on other
competing projects. That is a matter of fact. In relation to your
point about other cities, I think it is also important to be clear
that Barcelona, Beijing, Sydney and Athens all bid for and wanted
the Olympics because it would drive regeneration in their cities.
As I said in answer to, I think, Mr Wyatt's question, the judgment
is that the part of East London which would be the Olympic site
is currently planned for regeneration and the regeneration of
that part of London is not dependent on the Olympics. The Olympics
would add some value.
155. Taking that point up, you made it yesterday,
and you have inferred it this morning, that only London could
possibly be considered for a credible Olympic bid. Bearing in
mind that London is incredibly built up, is it not the case this
is the only opportunity we have left to credibly go to the IOC
and say we would like to host the Olympics, because once that
redevelopment has taken place in the East End there is simply
not another site left in London, which is the only city that can
bid for this bid, that can possibly take a case. The moment for
the United Kingdom to actually put forward an Olympic bid is now
because of that redevelopment opportunity. That closes and that
is it, the UK is not going to have an Olympic bid.
(Tessa Jowell) In looking at the balance sheet for
and against, the argument for the bidding, the aspirational balance
sheet, the actual costs in the balance sheet, the opportunity
costs in the balance sheet, the legacy benefits in the balance
sheet that is obviously a factor.
156. Once this goes that is it.
(Tessa Jowell) It is a judgment rather than a fact.
The judgment is that it is in East London that you get the synergy
between the space required for Olympic development and the planned
regeneration, so that is correct, yes. It is also likely that
after 2012 if those sites are not used for Olympic facilities
will have been developed for other purposes. There is a third
element, which again is more art than science, there is a feeling,
a belief dependent on decisions like where the 2010 Winter Olympics
will be held, that 2012 will be at the European Games and after
that the IOC will move to another continent. You are not categorically
right in what you say but there are certainly judgments that would
support your view.
Miss Kirkbride: Thank you, Mr Chairman.
Mr Flook
157. If the Commonwealth Games in Manchester
had not been a success would we be sitting here now? To put it
another way around, are you not a victim of your own success?
(Tessa Jowell) I think that is a very interesting
question. Obviously the consideration about whether or not to
bid for the Olympics preceded the Commonwealth Games and I think
we commissioned the Arup Report at the beginning of 2002. The
Arup Report, which has heavily informed judgments about the costs,
was commissioned long before the Commonwealth Games. I think there
are two things that the Commonwealth Games have changed, one is—and
I think there are those in the international sporting community
who have been quite explicit about this—the Commonwealth
Games demonstrated that the United Kingdom could host and could
deliver a fantastically successful sporting event on that scale.
Remember, the Olympics are 10 times the size of the Commonwealth
Games—it depends what measures you use—the Olympics
by a factor of more than two are much bigger, somewhere between
a factor of 4 to 8 bigger than the Commonwealth Games. I think
it is also fair to say that the right decision to withdraw from
hosting the 2005 World Athletics Championships did cost us in
confidence in international sporting circles and that was confidence
that was re-established with the success of the Commonwealth Games.
(Mr Caborn) I also think as a result of the IAAF indoor
games we are to run here in Birmingham in 2003, we have the Commonwealth
and the IAAF, and I am sure Birmingham will rise to the occasion
and produce an extremely good indoor games.
158. The DCMS will be aware that the Daily
Telegraph has been a big supporter of the notion of having
the Olympic Games in London, in Britain in 2012. I was interested
in today's Telegraph the honourable gentlemen, the member
for West Ham said that everyone has to get behind this—this
was reported from yesterday's Chamber—and almost sign up
for it in blood, a classic over- exaggeration on his part. The
Telegraph also says that the winability of the four, affordability,
deliverability, legacy and winability is about the only given,
which of course it is not. As a decision by the IOC is very likely
to be after the next General Election, because I believe that
it is in July 2005, and it is likely there could be an election
in May 2005, what would be the most important piece of advice
you would give your likely successor on how to take forward a
successful decision by the IOC to give London the 2012 Olympics?
(Tessa Jowell) I think that is a series of well phrased,
hypothetical questions. I cannot possibly answer about the date
of the next general election.
159. I appreciate that.
Chairman: Politically he is being totally
uncontroversial.
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