As Suedehead said, it's in accordance to all the main parties' policies past and present. Your point?

 

What do you mean? I thought that most political parties had different views on things and as Grimly says, you're being ridiculously optimistic, so I wondered if your views on this subject were the same as Labour's.

 

I will never vote Tory Gezza - if that's what you're trying to say! :lol:

What do you mean? I thought that most political parties had different views on things and as Grimly says, you're being ridiculously optimistic, so I wondered if your views on this subject were the same as Labour's.

 

I will never vote Tory Gezza - if that's what you're trying to say! :lol:

 

One of the founding principles of the Olympic bid (and we wouldn't have ever won it had this not been the case) was that all three major parties backed it. Ed Miliband may be slightly less enthusiastic about it than Blair was but even if he were opposed to the Games being here it'd be electoral suicide to say so. So yes, my views don't really differ from the party line.

What do you mean? I thought that most political parties had different views on things and as Grimly says, you're being ridiculously optimistic, so I wondered if your views on this subject were the same as Labour's.

 

I will never vote Tory Gezza - if that's what you're trying to say! :lol:

Political parties do typically have different views on things, but the business, sporting and cultural case for holding the Olympics here is fairly strong, even though there are downsides, so it has cross-party support. And for the record, I think GRIMLY's trying to have his cake and eat it. Fair enough to complain about the overcommercialisation of the Games, or to complain that it might not make a return, but you can't really do both at the same time. And the call of 'why should money be spent on this rather than NHS and welfare?' is fair enough but you could make the case for that for pretty much any discretionary spending outside of that - for example, on supporting sport infrastructure in the UK.

 

I'd say it's pretty generally accepted that government can have a role to play outside of NHS, welfare, police and education, and yeah, even though it's costing a fair whack, I'd say I support the Games being here as it will leave a strong legacy - a redeveloped East End (with affordable housing. I'd like more but it's not as if post-Games it's just going to be Kensington-by-Stratford), further funding for sporting infrastructure, and a feel-good factor of the once in a lifetime event that is having the Olympics in our country. Yes, the ticketing could be done far more fairly but I don't think you'll find all that many actually opposed to having the Olympics here. I'd also say it's pretty immature and absolutist to decide to no longer support a party over its stance on a fairly minor issue like this.

I'm absolutely certain that Scott and the reast of you moanin about the Olympics will be glued to your screens at 9pm on July 27th for the Opening Ceremony live.

This isn't exactly a great argument in favour of your case, Chris.

I'm going to take my life into my hands and go Devil's Advocate.

 

1. The Games, along with the Diamond Jubilee, have been hijacked by the political elite as a ‘bread and circuses’ diversion from the grim realities of the Age of Austerity. They are cutting £20 billion from the NHS, £18 billion from welfare, but they can find £12 billion for the Olympics.

This is money that's been budgeted for years. I don't agree with the extent of the cuts or their timing, but it would be a waste to pass up the advertising opportunity for London that the Olympics offers by cutting back and offering up an Austerity Games.

 

2. The Games are being used to showcase Britain ‘as though everything is nice and rosy in the garden’ (McCluskey). It isn’t. The gap between rich and poor is wider than at any time since the 1920s, and the welfare state on which most of us depend is being destroyed by cuts and privatisation. Only millionaires have anything to celebrate.

I'd contest the point that the Games are being used to showcase that everything is nice and rosy in the garden. I think the gap between rich and poor is a little besides the point. It's equivalent to complaining that a rom-com set in Britain now doesn't have the gap between rich and poor and the cuts to welfare at the centre of its plot. Just because millionaires are the only people doing well economically at the moment doesn't mean there's no grounds to celebrate a successful Olympics, unless you're so bloody minded that you think money is the be all and end all of what matters in life.

 

3. The economic and social devastation is deliberate. The business elite who will be hogging a good proportion of the 2.2 million seats not on sale to the public are directly responsible for the crash, the crisis, and the cuts. They should not be allowed to bask in the limelight as if all were well.

I'd like to see some facts and figures on the generic 'business elite' hogging the 2.2 million seats not for sale (which I don't agree with, for the record), but even that aside I wouldn't really say they're basking in the limelight by being in the audience.

 

4. Most ordinary people failed to get tickets. It is estimated that half those who staked £1,000 and two-thirds of those who staked £250 got nothing. Most poor people never had a hope.

Ordinary people stake £1,000 on tickets? Right. Anyway, as I've said, I think the ticketing could've been done far better, and there should've been free tickets given by lottery to locals.

 

5. Hardly anyone living near the main stadium has got tickets. But there will be no freebies for the deprived communities of Newham. All the freebies – 2.2 million of them – are reserved for VIPs, IOC guests, and corporate sponsors.

See above. But as an aside, what's wrong with corporate sponsors of the Olympics getting some free tickets? It's the equivalent of complaining that someone working at a shop gets a discount there.

 

6. The whole event is dominated by corporate sponsorship, corporate contracts, and corporate logos. There is no democratic control, no popular participation, no engagement with the local communities and businesses.

Yeah, a little engagement with the local communities and businesses would be nice, but it's fair to say the local businesses will probably be benefiting quite a bit from the influx of tourists. And just because corporate sponsors are getting free tickets doesn't mean there's no popular participation - it's not as if NOBODY from the real world is going to see these Games.

 

7. The corporatisation of the Games means corruption and cover-up. LOCOG is refusing to reveal how many tickets at major events are freebies. One estimate is that six in ten of the 80,000 tickets for top events like the men’s 100m final fall into this category. Meantime, corporate sponsors are doling out tickets as bonuses to staff or hospitality to clients. Global accountancy firm Deloitte is using a ‘large proportion … to reward staff achievements’. City HQs are to become ‘Olympic reception centres’ for the duration.

I don't really think it's an issue how firms allot the tickets they've been given in return for their sponsorship of the Games. They are however right that it is an issue if the freebies are being given out of proportion to the sponsorship of the Games.

 

8. The Westfield Shopping Centre is a moral obscenity. The whole first floor consists of designer shops with price tags beyond the reach of more than one in a hundred local people.

Moral obscenity, christ, put down the fucking pearls Counterfire! Is this really a reason to protest the Olympic Games? Yes, of course it would be nice and dandy* if the shops were all affordable but by now I think it's generally accepted that it's an unfortunate fact of life that designer shops, er, cost a lot of money. I don't see much issue with designer labels existing and charging the world for their products, mostly because I have no wish to own them.

 

9. Massive transport disruption is planned throughout the Games. This is so that the rich do not have to use public transport like the rest of us. Instead, freeways will be reserved through the London streets for the LOCOG fleet of 5,000 cars.

The language in this is ridiculous. LOCOG cars are by definition 'the rich' now? I don't agree with the privatisation of the roads but by this point it seems like they've stopped making their points like grown ups and are instead resorting to simplistic language to try and make you agree with their point by default. The roads are restricted (again, I emphasise, I don't agree with it) so people working for the Organising Committee and taking part in the Games can get from one place to another efficiently. Not so that anybody earning more than £x thousand doesn't have to use public transport.

 

10. The politicians, the corporations, and the rich own the London 2012 Games – not the British people. Yet only £1.4 billion has been contributed by sponsors compared with £12 billion by the taxpayer.

I'd say the British people attending the Games would disagree with this. But then, I have a feeling even more whinging would've gone on had this been entirely funded by sponsors.

Political parties do typically have different views on things, but the business, sporting and cultural case for holding the Olympics here is fairly strong, even though there are downsides, so it has cross-party support. And for the record, I think GRIMLY's trying to have his cake and eat it. Fair enough to complain about the overcommercialisation of the Games, or to complain that it might not make a return, but you can't really do both at the same time. And the call of 'why should money be spent on this rather than NHS and welfare?' is fair enough but you could make the case for that for pretty much any discretionary spending outside of that - for example, on supporting sport infrastructure in the UK.

 

I'd say it's pretty generally accepted that government can have a role to play outside of NHS, welfare, police and education, and yeah, even though it's costing a fair whack, I'd say I support the Games being here as it will leave a strong legacy - a redeveloped East End (with affordable housing. I'd like more but it's not as if post-Games it's just going to be Kensington-by-Stratford), further funding for sporting infrastructure, and a feel-good factor of the once in a lifetime event that is having the Olympics in our country. Yes, the ticketing could be done far more fairly but I don't think you'll find all that many actually opposed to having the Olympics here. I'd also say it's pretty immature and absolutist to decide to no longer support a party over its stance on a fairly minor issue like this.

 

I don't know that much about politics! Please be kind to my ignorance! :cry:

 

I have agreed with most of the points you've made though. :D

Edited June 16, 201213 yr by Griff

FWIW I don't agree with us hosting the Games and don't intend to watch one second of them on TV. France should have got them. Total waste of public money which could have been spent on pensions, hospitals, schools and increased benefits and personally I hope they go ti** up.

I'm absolutely certain that Scott and the rest of you moanin about the Olympics will be glued to your screens at 9pm on July 27th for the Opening Ceremony live.

All else aside, someone's changed their tune.

Has anyone seen this then? Will Scott comment? Guess not as this isn't what he wants to hear. :rolleyes:

 

From The Telegraph.

 

 

 

The cost of staging the Olympics will come in £476 million under its £9.3 billion budget, it was revealed today.

 

Jeremy Hunt said he was poised to write a “sizeable cheque” to Chancellor George Osborne.

 

Mr Hunt, who has Cabinet-level responsibility for the Games, issued a glowing end-of-term report on the London 2012 project. In an interview with the Standard, he praised the Olympic Park, adding that the huge turnout for the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations was a good omen for the Games.

 

The final quarterly update on Olympic finances before the Games — published by Mr Hunt’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport today — reveals that £476 million remains of a £2 billion pot for emergencies, which is part of the £9.3 billion overall budget. Mr Hunt said that tight controls on spending and incentivising contractors had kept costs under control, adding: “It is a massive testament to the way the project has been managed. This project is turning heads all over the world.

 

“The British construction industry has not had the best of reputations. We’ve been known for cost overruns and delays and here we have one of the biggest construction projects in Europe on time and set at the 2007 budget with nearly half a billion left in the pot.”

 

Extra items of expenditure this quarter have included a grant of £29 million to Games organiser Locog to install catering “pods” and £19 million for crowd management to cope with an influx for sports and cultural events. It will pay for 400 electronic screens at mainline railway stations in the South- East and extra stewards.

 

Such is the risk of lengthy queuing that families with young children and pregnant women may even be given their own fast track to enter the busiest Tube and rail stations, said Mr Hunt.

 

He also revealed that one million extra people visited London on three consecutive days for the Jubilee celebrations. “It astonished us all about the interest and excitement in it. The best ingredient of all was the good sense of the British people.

 

“The first lessons from the Jubilee are that providing we give people enough information, they want to make this a success. We know the Olympics is a bigger challenge for Londoners who want to get on with their daily lives.”

Edited June 17, 201213 yr by Common Sense

FWIW I don't agree with us hosting the Games and don't intend to watch one second of them on TV. France should have got them. Total waste of public money which could have been spent on pensions, hospitals, schools and increased benefits and personally I hope they go ti** up.

Has anyone seen this then? Will Scott comment? Guess not as this isn't what he wants to hear. :rolleyes:

 

From The Telegraph.

The cost of staging the Olympics will come in £476 million under its £9.3 billion budget, it was revealed today.

 

Jeremy Hunt said he was poised to write a “sizeable cheque” to Chancellor George Osborne.

 

Mr Hunt, who has Cabinet-level responsibility for the Games, issued a glowing end-of-term report on the London 2012 project. In an interview with the Standard, he praised the Olympic Park, adding that the huge turnout for the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations was a good omen for the Games.

 

The final quarterly update on Olympic finances before the Games — published by Mr Hunt’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport today — reveals that £476 million remains of a £2 billion pot for emergencies, which is part of the £9.3 billion overall budget. Mr Hunt said that tight controls on spending and incentivising contractors had kept costs under control, adding: “It is a massive testament to the way the project has been managed. This project is turning heads all over the world.

 

“The British construction industry has not had the best of reputations. We’ve been known for cost overruns and delays and here we have one of the biggest construction projects in Europe on time and set at the 2007 budget with nearly half a billion left in the pot.”

 

Extra items of expenditure this quarter have included a grant of £29 million to Games organiser Locog to install catering “pods” and £19 million for crowd management to cope with an influx for sports and cultural events. It will pay for 400 electronic screens at mainline railway stations in the South- East and extra stewards.

 

Such is the risk of lengthy queuing that families with young children and pregnant women may even be given their own fast track to enter the busiest Tube and rail stations, said Mr Hunt.

 

He also revealed that one million extra people visited London on three consecutive days for the Jubilee celebrations. “It astonished us all about the interest and excitement in it. The best ingredient of all was the good sense of the British people.

 

“The first lessons from the Jubilee are that providing we give people enough information, they want to make this a success. We know the Olympics is a bigger challenge for Londoners who want to get on with their daily lives.”

I repeat, someone's changed their tune.

Saying that they will come in under budget is disingenuous even by this government's standards. They will still cost far more than the original budget. I'm delighted the Olympics are being staged here but I don't like this sort of blatant dishonesty from ministers.

Has anyone seen this then? Will Scott comment? Guess not as this isn't what he wants to hear. :rolleyes:

 

From The Telegraph.

The cost of staging the Olympics will come in £476 million under its £9.3 billion budget, it was revealed today.

 

Jeremy Hunt said he was poised to write a “sizeable cheque” to Chancellor George Osborne.

 

Mr Hunt, who has Cabinet-level responsibility for the Games, issued a glowing end-of-term report on the London 2012 project. In an interview with the Standard, he praised the Olympic Park, adding that the huge turnout for the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations was a good omen for the Games.

 

The final quarterly update on Olympic finances before the Games — published by Mr Hunt’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport today — reveals that £476 million remains of a £2 billion pot for emergencies, which is part of the £9.3 billion overall budget. Mr Hunt said that tight controls on spending and incentivising contractors had kept costs under control, adding: “It is a massive testament to the way the project has been managed. This project is turning heads all over the world.

 

“The British construction industry has not had the best of reputations. We’ve been known for cost overruns and delays and here we have one of the biggest construction projects in Europe on time and set at the 2007 budget with nearly half a billion left in the pot.”

 

Extra items of expenditure this quarter have included a grant of £29 million to Games organiser Locog to install catering “pods” and £19 million for crowd management to cope with an influx for sports and cultural events. It will pay for 400 electronic screens at mainline railway stations in the South- East and extra stewards.

 

Such is the risk of lengthy queuing that families with young children and pregnant women may even be given their own fast track to enter the busiest Tube and rail stations, said Mr Hunt.

 

He also revealed that one million extra people visited London on three consecutive days for the Jubilee celebrations. “It astonished us all about the interest and excitement in it. The best ingredient of all was the good sense of the British people.

 

“The first lessons from the Jubilee are that providing we give people enough information, they want to make this a success. We know the Olympics is a bigger challenge for Londoners who want to get on with their daily lives.”

 

 

What the hell are you talking about, the ORIGINAL figure was £2bn ffs, that was the one that Ken Livingstone and New Labour put about at the time.... This is complete nonsense, it's OVER the original quoted figure by over £7bn you idiot..... -_-

Saying that they will come in under budget is disingenuous even by this government's standards. They will still cost far more than the original budget. I'm delighted the Olympics are being staged here but I don't like this sort of blatant dishonesty from ministers.

 

"Blatant Dishonesty" is Jeremy Hunt's Middle names though mate.....

And for the record, I think GRIMLY's trying to have his cake and eat it. Fair enough to complain about the overcommercialisation of the Games, or to complain that it might not make a return, but you can't really do both at the same time.

 

If you think that, then you clearly fail to understand my argument... There is no contradiction at all in this, the games ARE over-commercialised, and they wont make a return for London or Londoners.... This is yet again another example of the current Neo-Liberast thinking of "Public risk and private profits"... The tax-payer bears all the financial risk of the games, these Corporate Sponsors will be allowed to walk off with the profits from the increased revenue streams that millions of extra visitors bring in... Put it this way - millions more people consuming Coca Cola and McDonalds burgers will mean the UK profits for these companies will increase, the tax-payer will see none of that, that will go directly to Corporate HQ, or to off-shore tax havens, increased dividends to shareholder and bonuses for top executives... I repeat - Public Risk/Private Profit.... So, it's not in any way a contradiction to be against the over commercialisation and to criticise the games for representing very poor value for the tax-payer.....

Good old Charlie Brooker....... :lol: :lol:

 

Not excited by the Olympics? Then thank God for the sponsors

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/20...P=FBCNETTXT9038

 

The Olympic games trundle ever closer, and already you can smell the excitement in the air, because it's being wafted in by gigantic corporate excitement blowers. Try as they might to engage us, we're not on tenterhooks yet. On paper it's virtually illegal to be anything other than thrilled to self-pissing point at the prospect of hours of running, jumping, swimming etc filling our minds and airwaves for several weeks, but in reality, the majority of Britons appear to be acknowledging the forthcoming games with little more than an offhand shrug. We're just not that arsed – not right now, anyway. That'll change the moment any of our athletes gets within sniffing distance of any kind of medal – then it'll be all cheering and jubilant BBC montages – but until then we're being very British about the whole thing by largely ignoring it, aside from the odd quiet moan about the negative effect it'll have on the traffic.

 

It'd be worrisome if this low-level grumpiness extended into the Games themselves: if the crowd audibly tutted whenever anyone other than Britain won, and the medals were handed over by an official displaying the same vaguely begrudging air as a checkout assistant passing you a replacement carrier bag when the first one splits. That's definitely how we would behave if we didn't have guests. Hopefully instead we'll plaster on a fake smile for our overseas visitors, and after 10 minutes forget we were faking and actively start to enjoy the whole thing. But what if that doesn't happen? How else can we get into the spirit of the Games?

 

Well, for starters we could make that fake smile frosty-white by brushing our teeth with an Oral-B electric toothbrush. "Oral-B is getting behind the London 2012 Olympics," cheers the Boots website. "Share the excitement with their Professional Care 500 floss action electric toothbrush." Yes: the exhilaration, the agony, the sheer elation experienced by athletes operating at the peak of their physical aptitude – all this can be yours in the form of a vibrating twig you stick in your mouth.

 

In case you think the mere notion of an official Olympic electric toothbrush is absurd, remember: athletes need clean teeth to attain peak performance. Steve Ovett was the favourite to win the 1500m at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, but was hopelessly weighed down by a heavy buildup of plaque that had accumulated in his mouth in the months leading up to the contest, allowing Sebastian Coe to snatch the gold.

 

Oral-B's official Olympic toothbrush exists because its parent company, Procter & Gamble, has a sponsorship deal enabling it to associate all its products with the Games. That's why if you look up Viakal limescale remover on a supermarket website, the famous five interlocking rings pop up alongside it. This in no way cheapens the Olympic emblem, which traditionally symbolises global unity, peaceful competition and gleaming stainless steel shower baskets.

 

When you're done sprucing up your teeth and your bathroom, you could further embrace the Olympic spirit by slurping a Coca-Cola (official Olympic drink) followed by a Twirl from Cadbury's (official Olympic snack provider). Or really go the whole hog and polish off a couple of Sausage-and-Egg McMuffins at your local McDonald's (official Olympic restaurant), after which you should be ready to represent Britain in the 400-litre diarrhoea.

 

I've never understood why firms are prepared to shell out a fortune simply to refer to the Olympics in their advertising, but then I've always been mildly baffled by the popularity of sport full-stop. I also never understood why Gillette paid Tiger Woods, a man famous for hitting balls with a stick, a huge amount of money to promote scraping a bit of sharp metal across your face – only to sideline him when it became apparent that as well as hitting balls with a stick, he had been inserting his penis into as many different women as possible, an aspiration he presumably shared with the vast majority of Gillette's customers.

 

My natural inclination is to find the wave of "official" branding vaguely sinister, but on reflection it's actually rather touching the way these companies seem to earnestly believe their consumers give a toss. Will anyone in the country choose a Dairy Milk over a Yorkie just because the former has the Olympic rings printed on the wrapper? After all, now that it appears alongside everything from toothbrushes to Viakal, the official Olympic iconography has become just another bit of background visual noise – like the Keep Britain Tidy icon, or a barcode. Your brain filters it out before your mind even notices it was there in the first place. If I was Adidas (official Team GB Olympic outfitters), I'd be furious. At least sportswear has some connection to the traditional Olympic ideal of people from far-flung corners of the Earth engaging in hard physical graft for little financial reward, especially if it turns out it was made in an Indonesian sweatshop.

 

Instead, the Olympic rings have been whored around so much they've become valueless: a status symbol for a few corporations to tote like a badge for several weeks, impressing almost no one except themselves. It's bizarre, and it's increasingly far removed from the event itself, which, last time I checked, chiefly involves running around and jumping over things. And, if you're British, moaning about the traffic.

 

If you think that, then you clearly fail to understand my argument... There is no contradiction at all in this, the games ARE over-commercialised, and they wont make a return for London or Londoners.... This is yet again another example of the current Neo-Liberast thinking of "Public risk and private profits"... The tax-payer bears all the financial risk of the games, these Corporate Sponsors will be allowed to walk off with the profits from the increased revenue streams that millions of extra visitors bring in... Put it this way - millions more people consuming Coca Cola and McDonalds burgers will mean the UK profits for these companies will increase, the tax-payer will see none of that, that will go directly to Corporate HQ, or to off-shore tax havens, increased dividends to shareholder and bonuses for top executives... I repeat - Public Risk/Private Profit.... So, it's not in any way a contradiction to be against the over commercialisation and to criticise the games for representing very poor value for the tax-payer.....

 

Implying that none of the companies involved with the Games will pay any tax at all? Give over.

If you think that, then you clearly fail to understand my argument... There is no contradiction at all in this, the games ARE over-commercialised, and they wont make a return for London or Londoners.... This is yet again another example of the current Neo-Liberast thinking of "Public risk and private profits"... The tax-payer bears all the financial risk of the games, these Corporate Sponsors will be allowed to walk off with the profits from the increased revenue streams that millions of extra visitors bring in... Put it this way - millions more people consuming Coca Cola and McDonalds burgers will mean the UK profits for these companies will increase, the tax-payer will see none of that, that will go directly to Corporate HQ, or to off-shore tax havens, increased dividends to shareholder and bonuses for top executives... I repeat - Public Risk/Private Profit.... So, it's not in any way a contradiction to be against the over commercialisation and to criticise the games for representing very poor value for the tax-payer.....

And some of that increased revenue stream will come back to the British public through tax payments. For all the complaints about how companies don't pay enough tax I don't think it's really going to at all be the case that none of the companies who benefit from the Olympics will pay tax (and let's not forget that many businesses who don't have a thing to do with the Olympics will pay increased tax as a result of increased revenue - local businesses in the East of London, for one).

Implying that none of the companies involved with the Games will pay any tax at all? Give over.

 

Are Coca Cola and McDonalds British companies...?? All depends on where their Corporate HQs are... How else do you suppose Amazon avoids paying UK taxes...? Their Headquarters is in Luxembourg....

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbys...x-concerns.html

 

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-stag...justice-network