What did you do when the Olympic Torch passed by?

[Lime]

Not sports or games - just big business for rich people to get richer with.

Sorry, but I disagree with Lime and Penners, this was Biff's statement, saying the Olympic games are not sport or games.

Let's be clear.
You were the one who used the word liar.
You were the one who was unpleasant.
No one else has been rude or unpleasant except you.
Whether people like or dislike the games is a matter of opinion and upto themselves to decide, not for you or anyone else to dictate to or defame and libel.

 

[Feltwell]

Boris will bask in the glory and then go on to become our next PM.

There's a vision of hell if ever I heard one. I do however see two flaws in that plan:-

- The rest of the country must have more sense than London, surely? OK, maybe not :roll:

- Ed Miliband has years of work ahead of him if he hopes to reach the level of loathing that many felt for Ken Livingstone.


Now please - can we move onto less controversial subjects? Religion? Who's in the right in the Middle East? Why dogs are infinitely superior pets to cats?

Peace & Love

Feltwell

 

[skier-hughes]

Not sports or games - just big business for rich people to get richer with.

Sorry, but I disagree with Lime and Penners, this was Biff's statement, saying the Olympic games are not sport or games.

Let's be clear.

You were the one who used the word liar. Yes, because I believe Biff makes a profit from his window making, making him richer, which is something he declares not to be doing.

You were the one who was unpleasant. I found Biffs's remarks about the Olympics unpleasant, you agree with his views and don't, whereas you disagree with my views thus finding them unpleasant.

No one else has been rude or unpleasant except you. In your opinion, whereas I feel I was correcting a falsehood. It appears to be fine in this very thread to slam G4S for saying they'd do something and not doing it.

Whether people like or dislike the games is a matter of opinion and upto themselves to decide, not for you or anyone else to dictate to or defame and libel. You seem to be confused , I am not dictating to anyone, I don't mind if anyone holds differing views to mine, I will argue my point and I will post my "proof" of why I feel my view is better. Nor am I defaming or libeling, unless of course Biff doesn't make any profit from his window making thus he does not grow richer from it. If Biff wishes to post such remarks he must prove them to be true. You can await him doing so, I don't think he ever will be able to prove it, so I'm out of here, as I said the majority of you now hold differing views to mine. Bye.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Graham,

I really hope you only mean you're out of this thread.

And I'm sure everyone on here would say the same.

Except the dog lovers, who clearly don't understand why cats are better... :wink:

Robin

 

[LadyArowana]

Well, golly gosh, who knew that people carrying flaming sticks followed by other people giving away nasty drinks could be cause for such heated debate on the evils or not of being/ getting rich. Peace and love folks, peace and love..... which reminds me, where is Mr Robgil these days? Seems like quite a while since he posted here, lets all hope he is just busy busy with the beautiful cottage and family.

Can't comment on the cat V. dog issue, I have neither.

 

[Flyfisher]

Graham,

I really hope you only mean you're out of this thread.

And I'm sure everyone on here would say the same.

Hear hear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPIsTKpAoE4

 

[biffvernon]

G4S have brought shame on our Olympics. We had a good story until then, on time, on spec and under budget.

Under budget? Remind us what the announced budget was on the day the Olympics were awarded to London and what the final budget is likely to be.

Just yesterday I was talking to a friend who has picked up a nice piece of work. He said "They're pissing money against a wall so I'm just catching a few drops that splash back".

Anti-aircraft missiles on roofs of people's homes? So preparing to shoot down aircraft over a city is a smart idea?

The biggest military operation since World War II? So that's what it takes to organise a game in a park?

As for G4S, who runs them?

 

[JoceAndChris]

I have to say I agree with you Biff.

I've never found organised games inspiring, uplifting, motivational, humbling. I find them humiliating, intimidating, remote, wasteful, self-important, patronising and bizarre. Why we should pay such unimaginable figures to invite throwers of poles, and jumpers over sticks, and watchers of throwers of poles etc, into an already too-crowded capital, is beyond me, well, it's like something out of a Dr Seuss story, only less amusing. Imagine that money had gone into our healthcare!

Oh, where's my mid-morning cake and gin.

 

[Pford75]

Imagine that money had gone into our healthcare!

I predicted that the thread would eventually plunge to these depths. Sadly, the vogue these days seems to be to convert the cost of anything which one does not agree with into 'intensive care baby units'. The problem I have with this is that by logical extension, all spending on the Arts and culture should also be similarly diverted. Let's not stop at the Olympics...let's close all museums, remove all public art and melt it down for scrap value...that parkland could make a cheap site for the next hospital etc.

I wouldn't want to live in a society where all public spending was assessed in these terms. There would be no civic pride, no joy...little to lift the spirits from the daily drudgery. Those who think this way about the Olympics fail to measure the value of the joy which will be experienced by so many people around the Olympics (think of the response to the Wimbledon final). A heroic run, a determined competitor a triumph of spirit against overwhelming odds...these things can make people feel good....and right now a lot of people need it.

A final hard economic point....London is full! For the first time in my memory, London is bursting with visitors, hotels are crammed. I was at Westimnster Abbey a few days ago and the queues stretched for miles. People from all over the world are coming to the UK and hopefully will enjoy it. When we think about the spending on the Olympics, let's at least agree that there will be some economic benefits to the area....and perhaps even a little joy ;-)

 

[vicky whitworth]

London is full? That's not what the cab drivers have been saying to me over the last few days nor how I experienced it. Whether it will pick up next week, who knows. All I advise is don't get a cabbie talking about the Olympic lanes... :lol:

 

[Flyfisher]

....and perhaps even a little joy ;-)

Well this Oylmpic story made me smile: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18895512

 

[AMc]

Olympic spirit alive and well in Bury St. Edmunds.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/9410336/London-2012-Olympics-Rwanda-team-overwhelmed-by-the-generosity-of-host-town-for-their-pre-Games-training-camp.html

 

[biffvernon]

I don't suppose that Joss really meant that the money should all have been spent on healthcare - that's a bit of a metaphorical way of talking, Pford75, and I expect everyone on this forum is a supporter of spending on arts and culture. I know of several bits of the Arts Council budget that have been cut in the last two years in favour of Olympic spending. For example, we have in Louth a fine 18th century listed building lying empty that is owned by the charity that runs our museum. We would have liked to repair, renovate and use it as museum and gallery space and had a costed project all lined up with grants applied for and all ready and expecting to go. Then the plans were pulled as the money had run out. No prizes for guessing why.

 

[Gervase]

I think the Olympics are great. I just wish they were being held in Paris.
As it is, we are spending up to £17 billion on 17 days of sport - much of which will, of course, be thrilling and gripping. But the cost is simply mind-boggling. We keep hearing the word "legacy" muttered as if it was a mantra to keep the cynics at bay, but the omens aren't good. If one looks at what has happened after the last three Olympics in Atlanta, Athens or Sydney one sees empty stadia, underused facilities and a huge sense of "Was that it? What do we do now - other than continue to pay for it?".
As for increasing participation in sport, I fear the Olympics will do just the opposite. No Games have ever done that in the host nation - in fact, in Australia, participation went markedly down after the Sydney Olympics! And in the UK vast sums have been syphoned away from the grass roots to pump into medal-winning prospects at a national level, with no thought as to from whence those potential medal winners came. For example, sports charities are now £670 million worse off, and have now been told that it will be a decade before they start receiving decent support again thanks to the cost of the Games.
Those sports which were on the Olympic medal wish-list were told their funding would be cut if they did not concentrate on medal prospects. Non-Olympic sports had their funding slashed completely, and all Lottery funding which previously went to grass roots went to the new Olympic pot.
So, if youngsters are inspired by what they see in the coming month they will find that their local clubs and facilities have been starved of funding for seven years and will be for the next 10 years.
Let's face it, if putting on a world-class sporting event boosted our chances, why doesn't a Brit win Wimbledon every year, or a Frenchman the Tour de France?
A friend and former colleague took part in many of the earliest meetings when the bid was being prepared, and says there were only two issues under discussion: could a London bid succeed, and how much would a bid cost. No thought was given to the cost of the Games themselves and none at all to what would happen after the Games. In his view the notion of "legacy" was a bogus and belated attempt to justify the hideously obscene cost of putting on 17 days of sport.‎
There's a very good documentary series on BBC at the moment called "2012" which pretty accurately shows the clusterf*ck that has been the Olympics.
And don't get me started on the corporate nonsense, or the fact that London will be crippled for three weeks and the knock-on cost of that...

 

[Gervase]

One thing does puzzle/amuse me. The Government has refused to sanction more spending on basic, grass-roots infrastructure on the basis that it has rejected Keynesian economics and that public spending cannot kickstart a sick economy. Yet it is pinning great hopes on the idea that spending an obscenely large amount of money on a herd of white elephants will somehow regenerate a vast swathe of London and boost the economy. All very Keynesian.
For a look at the potential legacy, read this on Athens after their games, and this on Stratford after £9 billion-worth of "kick-starting".

 

[Gervase]

Remind us what the announced budget was on the day the Olympics were awarded to London and what the final budget is likely to be.

When London won the bid in 205 the predicted cost of staging the Olympics was £2.37 billion.
The Olympics public sector funding package, which covers the building of the venues, security and policing, was increased to around £9.3bn in 2007. Since then an extra £1.1 billion has been spent on extra security and router-terrorism measures, while a host of other estimates have been exceeded. As a result, it's quite hard to find exact figures for the final cost - particularly as the figures are changing by the week - but the latest estimate for the Games themselves is £11 billion.
That sum doesn't include cancelling police and Army leave, putting a warship in the Thames, stationing ground to air missiles on tower blocks, putting 11,000 troops on security duty, the third of a billion to be spent to make the Olympic park a non-Olympic park afterwards, TFL's redesigning London's roads and then returning them to normal afterwards, the cost of regenerating the Lower Lea Valley and so on and on and on...
Hence the figure I was quoted by a well-informed sports writer of £17 billion.
£2.37 billion vs £17 billion. Oops!

 

[biffvernon]

So that gives Gervase a score of +3. One for each of the last three comments.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

The direct cost of the Olympics is just under twice what we will spend in those 17days on non-pensions welfare spending.

In terms of value for money that puts another perspective on it - and excludes the economic benefits of tourism, business, etc that the Olympics will bring.

Imagine if we spent that £5bn of welfare on healthcare instead. We'd all have our own intensive care baby incubator. :wink:

http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_welfare_spending_40.html

 

[biffvernon]

Ah look, it does have a function after all...

 

[MatthewC]

The setup for the Olympics has gone amazingly smoothly so far - no stories of half-built stadiums that won't be finished on time, accomodation that's sub-standard etc, as we've heard so often in the past elsewhere. Love or loathe the games, it's a significant achievement to get the setup just to where it is now.

I have to disagree. The rowing will be at Eton Dorney which was announced as "ready" at the end of May, but my son was there on Tuesday and said that they still have two weeks work to do. The site should now be locked down for security checks but these cannot be done as there are contractors (exc ept G4S!) all over the place. G4S have provided just three people to patrol a perimeter of 8km..