The Olympics Junket

Sam Leith takes a delightfully cynical stab at the London Olympics:

My colleague Andrew Gimson this week rightly admonished the Culture Secretary, James Purnell, for his boasting about the 2012 Olympic Games. He suggests modesty and frugality, rather than vulgar extravagance, would better honour our Olympic year. I would go further. How does no Olympics at all sound?

It sounds excellent, Sam. Of course, the truly poisonous Ken Livingstone wouldn’t agree.

What, after all, is the Olympics? A giant boondoggle. A fireworks display. A primeval exercise in public bombast, encouraged by preening politicians self-intoxicated with the idea that they are leading the nation in glorious celebration. We didn’t ask for them, we don’t want them, and I urge every killjoy in the country to join me in demanding that the 2012 Olympics be scrapped.

Again, I agree – although, I don’t think you need to be a killjoy to be opposed to this huge waste of public money.  Although I find sport incredibly tedious and overrated, I have no problem with people enjoying it. I do, however, have a massive problem with politicians propping up their already inflated egos spending huge amounts of public – i.e. other peoples’ – money on their favoured junket.

That is quite apart from the fiscal incompetence of the whole thing, as Sam points out.

In July 2005, the initial estimate of the cost of building the Olympic site was named as £2.4 billion – with, as I understand it, an additional £1 billion for infrastructure, and £1 billion on staging the Games.

And we all knew that was bollocks. Not cynicism; merely acknowledgement of the obvious. A recognition of previous performance.

In November 2005, Lord Coe pooh-poohed reports that the costs of staging the games would double. “The reports are wrong,” he said. “It’s not the first scare story and it won’t be the last.”

He lied. And, which is more, we knew he was lying at the time.

In November 2006, Tessa Jowell admitted the cost of the site would be £3.3 billion – 40 per cent more.

Yup, he lied.

Four months later, she revised her estimate again. The budget was now to be £9.35 billion: four times the initial estimate.

Four times the estimate. So, perhaps Coe wasn’t lying – after all, technically he was right; it didn’t double… If I performed that badly in my job, I’d be out of it pretty damn sharpish – and quite rightly too. This isn’t incompetence, it is serial incompetence. And, which is far, far worse, it is other peoples’ money they are squandering to pay for this shit.

She also set aside an extra £2.7 billion for a contingency fund, apparently to prevent contractors holding the Government to ransom – which is rather like filling a suitcase with used notes in order to ward off kidnappers.

Words fail me on this one. Not only are they morally bankrupt, not only are they incapable of managing the proverbial newts’ tea party down the local, but they tacitly acknowledge their inabilities by having a contingency fund. And who is going to pay for all of this? Oh, yes, London Council tax payers – who, I might add, were never asked if they wanted this juvenile jamboree. No, Ken decided that they were to get it and pay for it whatever they thought about the matter.

The £400,000 logo, loathed by all, was defended by Miss Jowell as “terrific” – on the grounds it had “got people talking” about how much they loathed it.

Ah, yes, that talentless, artistically challenged excuse for a logo. Well, it may have got people talking, but if universal condemnation – as was appropriate for something so goddamned awful – is somehow positive in the fantasy land Tessa Jowell occupies, one has to wonder about her fitness for her post. Actually, I don’t wonder at all…

Sam then goes on to ask pertinent questions about the whole rigmarole of the Olympics:

But why is it so important we have “the best Olympics ever” – as opposed to the best education, healthcare, public housing, green spaces or libraries ever?

I can answer that question. It is not important to have the Olympics. It is a nasty, corrupt, expensive waste of taxpayer’s money. If it is so bloody good, then it will be self funding – in which case, I would have no problem with it. And, yes, money extorted from taxpayers should be spent on those things that taxpayers need – not a vehicle for Ken Livingstone and his hangers on to use for their own self-aggrandisement.

The Olympics, when you strip away all the pompous guff about the triumph of the human spirit, is school sports day for grown-ups. Look! People who run a bit faster than other people! Miraculous! No, hang on. Here’s one who lifts up heavy stuff. And this one – wow. Brilliant. She’s really bendy.

Quite. I spent my school sports days at the back of the field somewhere with a small group of like minded individuals, keeping out of the way of watchful eyes, sun bathing or reading a book. I was, one year, castigated by the head girl of our house for lacking in team spirit and loyalty. She wasn’t too pleased when I (reasonably, I thought) pointed out that the house had done nothing to earn my loyalty and neither had she and that I had no intention of trying to run a bit faster than other people as it was a waste of my time and energy. She didn’t try that one again. I wonder why? Actually, she didn’t speak to me again, which was a bit of a relief.

I do notice in the comments, that not everyone agrees with Sam Leith. This from someone called Adam Brown:

I’d like to compare the forthcoming games with a party. Yes, we could spend all our money on books, a slightly newer run of the mill family car and other mundane expenses as Mr Leith urges the government to do but sometimes countries as well as individuals just need to have a big party, let their hair down and show the world that they can have a good time and what better way to do that than through sport? Of course as with any party there will always be a couple of people intent on sitting in the corner, looking miserable and making cynical remarks about the music being played.

What Adam is missing is the crucial bit about it being “someone else’s” money. If you spend someone else’s money on your party, likely as not you will be arrested for stealing. There is nothing cynical about deploring the misuse of public funds. As to “what better way to let one’s hair down than though sport”, then I suggest that Adam hasn’t much imagination. Watching some people run a bit faster than other people is monumentally dull. If that floats his boat, then fine; don’t assume that everyone else thinks it’s a barrel of laughs; it ain’t.

We can either enjoy the Olympics or we can be the person in the corner stewing in their cynicism. I shall choose to do the first.

Certainly Adam, you selfish bastard. It will be a party other people will have paid for. I do hope you enjoy it, because those other people will be picking up the tab for your enjoyment for the next quarter of a century.