Sunday, November 30, 2008

LORD COE CALMS OLYMPIC MONEY FEARS


As the credit crunch continues to bite, Lord Sebastian Coe has calmed Olympic money fears and reassured the Olympic Committee that London will still be going ahead with plans to host the Olympic Games in 2012, despite the current economic climate. London is currently facing a major challenge to stay within its £9.3billion budget, mainly because of problems in raising the anticipated level of private financing to cover the cost of the £40million media centre and £1billion Olympic village.

After the lavish spectacular of the Beijing Olympic Games, Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge stressed the importance of holding down the cost and size of future games to ensure that they remained affordable in these current tough economic times. Lord Coe once an Olympic athlete himself, stated that the economic climate in Britain now was very different to the time when London first bid for the chance to host the games but nevertheless the city was determined to honour its commitments. Oh well they could always host an “It’s a Knockout” style games and save even more money. Maybe Stuart Hall will come out of retirement to host them. Just a suggestion! Ha ha!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't believe I have heard of a single country in recent times that stayed on budget went it came to the games. I'm sure after the lavishness we saw in China this summer, London feels pressure to surpass it. It's a lot of pressure I'm sure.

Jackie said...

We have the same problem. With all the huge stadiums being built with their support systems for the World Football Cup in 2010, huge inflation etc we could lose billions if not supported well.

Naomi said...

I agree Melissa, I think every country that hosts the Olympics wants to put on an even more lavish event than the last one.

Yes I think it's alway a huge gamble when countries host big events like this Jackie.