Olympics and Paralympics (Funding)

Tracey Crouch Excerpts

Monday 27th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this important debate on the Olympics estimates. It is always a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Louise Mensch). I read her contribution to the Select Committee debate—it provided interesting research material for today’s debate, which has been interesting so far.

I congratulate the previous Government not only on securing the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic games but on setting a realistic estimated budget for the delivery of the games. Their announcement, in March 2007, of an increase from the initial estimate of £2.3 billion at the time of the bid to £9.3 billion attracted unwelcome and negative comment at the time, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) said, it is probably much better to announce a large increase in one go than to announce incremental increases over time, and we welcome the fact that they did so.

However, even with the cost savings announced in May 2010 and the recent increase in the security allocation, the estimated budget looks about right. That is important, because previous games have ended up two or three times over budget and in these times of financial constraint it is essential that British taxpayers do not feel that they have overfunded a sporting event.

What is clear—this is why it is important that we welcome the realistic setting of the funding package—is that, although we must not overspend on what is essentially a sporting event, we must not underfund it either. The Olympics are not just any old sporting event; they are the world’s greatest sporting event. More than 200 nations will compete in some form of Olympic game and the event will be watched by a global audience of billions. The 2008 Beijing Olympic games had an estimated global audience of 4.7 billion, which was significantly higher than the 3.9 billion achieved in Athens in 2004. I see no reason why London 2012 will not achieve something around the 4 billion mark, so the world will literally be watching our ability to stage the games. It is therefore essential that we do not fail. Much of the viewing total will be clocked up at the opening ceremony. With 80,000 spectators and 130 heads of state expected to be in the stadium, more than 1 billion people are expected to watch the ceremony on television. Again, an important balancing act must be achieved between providing good value for money for the British taxpayer funding the ceremonies and showcasing the country to the world.

The Secretary of State is right that this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I think that everyone acknowledges that our ceremonies will not be as extravagant or expensive as those in Beijing, but we must grasp the opportunity while we have it, because if it succeeds the taxpayer will benefit, but if we fail not only will it be a financial disaster, but it will be the Government who get the blame.

[Louise Mensch]

I completely endorse everything my hon. Friend is saying, but I put it her that, although the ceremonies might not be as expensive as those in Beijing, I have good reason to believe that they will be every bit as extravagant and just as good, if not better.

[Tracey Crouch]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Indeed, she demonstrated in her speech that we can put on a good event, as the new year fireworks demonstrated this year—as she so eloquently put it, they put Sydney to shame—so we can certainly do this.

It is important that we get the balancing act right for the taxpayer. Of course, if financial tightrope walking was an Olympic sport, all of us here today would be willing the Minister into the gold medal position. Arguments will take place over funding for specific aspects of the Olympics, such as security, ticketing, ceremonies and so on, but I believe that the most important part is the bit that we probably cannot put a price tag on: the legacy of London 2012. For many youngsters, these will be the first Olympic games they remember, and it is here on their doorsteps. I vaguely remember watching the 1980 games while sitting with my dad on the sofa, but it was the 1984 Los Angeles games that really began to penetrate my memory, with Coe, Ovett and Cram becoming instant playground icons.

[Justin Tomlinson]

I share my hon. Friend’s happy memories. In fact, my friends and I were so inspired that we soon dashed out in our quest to become mini athletes, admittedly at varying levels of success. Clearly our Olympics have the potential to inspire a generation, so does my hon. Friend agree that it is essential that we all support the Government’s plans for the school games?

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[Tracey Crouch]

I certainly agree. I am lucky to share a county with the Minister, who has been a strong advocate of encouraging people to participate in sport and the games. We would encourage not only greater participation, but inter and intra-school competitiveness, which I think is hugely important.

[Amber Rudd]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the legacy of the Olympics for young people is not just about individual sports, but about the importance of competition within those sports, because competition is such an important part of succeeding in this world?

[Tracey Crouch]

I completely agree. For too long we have had an “everyone should have prizes” culture, and the great thing about sport is that it does encourage competitiveness. Competitiveness is right at a particular age: it is important to ensure that young people at an early age engage in sport, but as they get older competitiveness becomes a hugely important part.

Returning to the 1984 LA Olympics, I only remember the track events to be perfectly honest, perhaps because that is all television showed at the time. There was no red button to switch from the popular track and field events to others.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

I am enjoying my hon. Friend’s recollection of the Los Angeles Olympics. Hockey was given a terrific boost as a result of the success of the men’s team, who won an unprecedented bronze medal at the time. Interest in the sport was given a huge boost.

[Tracey Crouch]

I completely agree, and my hon. Friend will be aware that there are three Kent players in the GB team, so we look forward to an increase in people’s participation in hockey, although my memories of it, at a girl’s school in his constituency, fill me with horror sometimes.

With the advent of multi-platform broadcasting, I am excited for our younger generation, who will be able to watch almost any event live in their front rooms and be awed or inspired by the athleticism of our British competitors. Medway, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti) said, will host various teams in the run-up to the Olympic and Paralympic games, including the Portuguese gymnastics and trampolining squads and the Barbados Paralympic team.

The Olympic torch will come to Chatham, as it will to other towns, giving local people a real sense of participation in the games. I learned recently that I have a former Olympian living in my constituency. Frank Sando ran the 10,000m in the 1952 and 1956 Olympics, finishing a respectable 5th in Helsinki but 10th in Melbourne. He was, however, a dominant force in international cross-country for most of the ’50s, and I am sure that he will act as an inspiration to many locally, who may go on to join Maidstone Harriers, a popular athletics club.

[Richard Harrington (Watford) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that her being able to cite people in her constituency who go back to the 1952 games shows the real long-term legacy of the Olympics? People write themselves into history, and the rest of us—in this House and everywhere else—remember them. I am therefore absolutely certain that holding the Olympics in this country is the right thing, and that the legacy will go well beyond £1 billion, or however it might be quantified in monetary terms.

[Tracey Crouch]

I completely agree, and it is not just about the people, but about the clubs that help prepare the athletes to reach major sporting events such as the Olympics. Our investment in that legacy will show a huge return in the long term.

As a Kent and Medway MP I am delighted that we, as a county, have a number of locally born and bred athletes taking part in this year’s Olympics. The county will join the country in being 100% behind each and every one of them in whatever sport.

As the House knows, I remain involved in girls football, and the 13 and 14-year-old girls I see every weekend, and their friends, will be able to watch someone such as the world’s number one trampolinist, Kat Driscoll, who grew up in Chatham and went to the same schools as them, compete for an Olympic gold medal; and she can serve only to inspire and encourage them to remain active. We have an opportunity nationally to showcase Great Britain to the world, and I hope that Kent and Medway athletes will play their part.

[Louise Mensch]

My hon. Friend refers, as I did, to an Olympian in her constituency. Does she not agree that that is part of the answer to those who say that the Olympics are too London-centric? We all see in our local areas, whether through the Olympic torch, schools sports or the Olympians who come from our constituencies, that the games are touching, and providing a legacy to, the whole country. London is merely the location, but the Olympics are held in all our hearts.

[Tracey Crouch]

I completely agree, but let us remember that there are several sporting events in the Olympics and not all will take place in London. Such factors will encourage people from all over the country to go to the Olympics, but the Olympics themselves will be spread far and wide across the nation.

The estimated budget, as supported by today’s motion, was realistically set by the previous Government and has been managed excellently by this Government and by the delivery organisations. I appreciate that it sounds like a lot of money to spend on a few weeks of events, but the benefits, economic and otherwise, of ensuring that we have the world’s greatest, most historic sporting event far outweigh the downsides. I am sure that the whole House will join me in praying that London 2012 runs smoothly and without incident and that we can provide a strong Olympic legacy to benefit many people for years to come.

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[Tessa Jowell]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. We have shared considerable concerns about the risks of that particular sponsorship and its investment in providing the wrap for the Olympic stadium. We have to be realistic about the degree and fundamental nature of change that the Olympic games alone can achieve, but they provide a moment to shine a bright light on continuing injustice in the world. We should never forget the suffering of the up to 25,000 people who died in the wake of the Union Carbide disaster. Neither should we forget that Saudi Arabia is the only country that will not be sending a team that includes women, flying in the face of the International Olympic Committee commitment—the Olympic commitment—to gender equality. Nor should we forget the stories about the exploitation of children, which I am glad to say were rapidly acted on by LOCOG. The Dow sponsorship will remain controversial, and I am glad that my right hon. Friend has raised that issue.

Let me return briefly to the two central commitments on legacy. First, on the regeneration of east London, many have rightly paid tribute to the outstanding work of the Olympic Delivery Authority, led by David Higgins, Dennis Hone and, of course, Sir John Armitt. They have done something that nobody believed possible when we started on this long course nearly 10 years ago. That work is a fantastic advertisement for a bold, confident UK plc and for the work force of the UK and I very much hope that the benefit of that investment—the expertise that been so carefully developed—can be traded around the world after our games.

This has been Europe’s largest public sector construction project and, possibly, the most ambitious exercise in regeneration. We have had many arguments over the Dispatch Box about the Olympic budget. When Labour was in government, we increased the scale of the ambition. Yes, we could have put what was called a flat-pack games on a contaminated site, but if we had not undertaken the regeneration of the site we could never have built homes there or built the polyclinic for which my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown) has campaigned so hard. Neither could we have had the venues with legacy use for our elite athletes of the future and for the young people of the communities in the six Olympic boroughs. Of the money spent on constructing the park, 75p in every pound has been spent on regeneration—on cleaning the soil, decontaminating the site, getting rid of the waterlogging and installing the wetland area that means that Canning Town will be protected from flooding. That is real regeneration in action. Some 90% of the material derived from demolition at that site was taken to be recycled.

As the hon. Member for Corby (Louise Mensch) rightly said, however, we have to measure the legacy in terms of more than just physical structures. For example, there has been a recreation of opportunity in the lives of the people who have worked on the park and in the lives of people in that part of east London, which houses two of the most deprived boroughs in the country. Of the 40,000 people who have worked in the Olympic park, 20% have come from the six boroughs and 13% were previously unemployed. There has been special focus on apprentices, with three times the regional average working not only in the park but on the construction of the village and at Westfield, where there are 10,000 permanent jobs and a retail skills academy.

There has also been a story around the country, which has been referred to by hon. Members, of contracts being let at a time of severe economic anxiety for small and medium-sized enterprises. The fact that such businesses have won 1,500 contracts means that we can tell a story of the Olympic park—of the steel for the aquatic centre coming from Neath, of the turf in the field of play coming from Huddersfield, of the steel for the Olympic stadium coming from Bolton and of the plants coming from Thetford. So, there has been investment in creating opportunities in the lives of a population who would not have had those opportunities were it not for the Olympic games.

Let me speak briefly about the second commitment—transforming a generation of young people through sport. That is a commitment not only for this country but for others around the world. The whole House can feel proud of the international inspiration programme now going on in 20 countries, which the organisers of the Rio games have agreed to take forward. In Bangladesh, 80,000 children have been taught to swim, and in north-west Brazil there have been leadership programmes. Magic Bus, which I know well—I have the bracelet—is a child development programme that uses sport to engage children in education.

All that has been achieved against a background of absolutely solid cross-party support, but there has been one decision that was incomprehensible: the dismantling of the organisation of sport for children in primary and secondary schools under which every child was doing two hours a week of sport. Those children were competing and had a choice of being involved in up to 14 sports. In the spirit of collaboration that has been such an important part of this process, I am prepared to wait and see how the Government’s plan unfolds, but I think the abandonment of school sport partnerships and of sport and physical activity for children in primary school and for younger children in secondary school is a terrible, missed opportunity. However, I do not hold the Minister or the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport responsible for that.

Many thanks are due: the plaudits for LOCOG will be endless, but we also celebrate the world-class excellence of, the ODA and the fact that it has achieved so much. We thank Sir Charles Allen, who has given life to the nations and regions programme, so that we will see all of the UK celebrating and creating its own experience of the Olympics. The Olympic Park Legacy Company has taken an extraordinary lead. The hon. Member for Corby was right to say how extraordinary it is that seven of the eight venues already have long-term tenants. We can be confident that the site will be a great social, commercial and sporting centre for London in the future.

[Tracey Crouch]

Will the right hon. Lady join me in thanking the private companies that have over a number of years invested in our athletes, but that will get nothing from the Olympic games, perhaps because they are not official sponsors? Aviva, where I worked before entering Parliament, has sponsored elite athletes; British Gas has sponsored swimmers, I believe, and other companies have sponsored gymnasts. They have helped our athletes to perform the best they can at the forthcoming Olympics.

[Tessa Jowell]

I am delighted to support everything the hon. Lady says. Through UK Sport, our athletes have been the beneficiaries of unprecedented funding to enable them to do their very best in front of the home crowd, but this is quintessentially a public-private partnership. I know the support that athletes have received from their sponsors has been indispensable, as has the sponsorship by some of our great companies of the games themselves.