LOCOG put in the lime light by MPs for not being within budget – London Olympics 2012
The London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games has recently been criticised for letting the cost of the upcoming London 2012 Olympics Games exceed budget.
The criticism received by LOCOG this time around had come from the British Member Parliaments. However, the government of Great Britain has rejected the conclusion reached by the MPs about the costs of the Olympic Games.
According to the report released by the parliament’s spending watchdog, the cost of the Olympic Games that are going to take place for the third time in the capital of England have reached 2 billion pounds over budget. The current cost of the Olympic Games
have exceeded the figure of 11 billion pounds. On the other hand, the expected cost of security at the Olympic venues have risen to double that of the initial amount. The LOCOG had stated that the budget for the Olympic Games will not be more than 9.3 billion
pounds.
The chair of the public accounts committee that released the report on the Olympics budget, Margaret Hodge, expressed herself on the matter in the following manner, “Locog now needs more than twice the number of security guards it originally estimated and
the costs have roughly doubled. It is staggering that the original estimates were so wrong. Locog has had to renegotiate its contract with G4S for venue security from a weak negotiating position and there is a big question mark over whether it secured a good
deal for the taxpayer.”
The planned number of security personnel that the LOCOG had estimated at the beginning was 10,000, however, as the Olympic Games are drawing nearer, the LOCOG’s total requirement of security personnel at the Olympic venues during the Games that start form
July 27, has increased to a figure of 23,700.
The LOCOG has been criticised in severe words about the difference in the initial estimates put forward by the committee and its current requirements. According to the report, it would be a hard task for the LOCOG to stick to the public funded figure of
9.3 billion pounds.
However, the LOCOG is optimistically stating that the Olympic Games will be within budget.
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