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March 10th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda The Commons’ Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said the games are deemed to go over their £9.3 billion budget by £1.7 billion especially due to the wrong estimates of the security costs if not for the fact that the costly Olympics projects, such as the £500-million Olympics Stadium in Stratford, could become white elephants after the games.
“The £9.3bn public sector funding package [for Olympics] is close to being used up and we are concerned about whether the running of the games will be held within budget,” PAC chair Margaret Hodge said.
“Taking into account costs outside the package, the full cost to the public of the Games and legacy projects is already heading for around £11bn,” Hodge added.
The Department for Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS) has insisted that the cost of purchasing the Olympic Park land should not be included in the estimates of the games’ overall costs as the money would return “to the public purse” through the “resale” of the land.
The DCMS has also said the “legacy programs” including the venues built specifically for the Olympics are not included in the estimates of the costs as they are going to be handed to tenants, six of which are already secured.
This is while the deal with West Ham United Football Club to take over the Olympic stadium has already been cancelled and the details of other such tenants have not been published.
The PAC also warned about “significant” increases in the security costs of the Olympics as the government raised the number of security personnel for the games from the 10,000 estimated by the games organizer Locog to 23,700 in December.
The change almost doubles the security price of the Olympics from £282 million to £553 million.
“It is staggering that the original estimates were so wrong,” Hodge said.
“Locog itself now has almost no contingency left to meet further costs, even though it has done well in its revenue generation,” she added.
The news of the Olympics’ astronomical extra costs come as Britain’s biggest union, Unite, has threatened it will launch strikes during the games to show foreign visitors that the situation is not “rosy” as the government is tightening the financial noose around public sector workers.
“If the Olympics provide us with an opportunity, that’s exactly one that we should be looking at,” Unite’s general secretary Len McCluskey said last month.
“The idea that the world should arrive in London and have these wonderful Games as though everything is nice and rosy in the garden is unthinkable,” he added.
AMR/HJL/HE
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