May 02, 2008	Friday	Rabi-us-Sani 25, 1429

LONDON, May 1: A group of British lawmakers has accused organisers of the 2012 London Olympics of being “willing to spend money like water” and urged them to keep the cost of the games under the most recent estimate of 9.325 billion pounds (US$18.4 billion).

The government’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee released a report on Wednesday criticising the huge increase in the projected overall cost of staging the games since the bidding process in 2004 and warned against any further hike.

The cost has more than doubled from the 4.036 billion pounds ($8 billion) forecast four years ago, and the committee said that such a huge increase was far greater than could be reasonably expected.

The committee was especially critical of the fourfold increase in the cost of the Aquatics Centre, which is now expected to be 303 million pounds ($598 million).

“The concept of the Aquatics Centre might be spectacular and eye-catching; but it appears to be over-designed and will be an expensive way of providing the facilities for water sports needed during and after the games,” the report said.

“In our opinion, the history of the Aquatics Centre shows a risible approach to cost control and that the games organisers seem to be willing to spend money like water.”

The committee, which monitors the Department of Culture, Media and Sport on behalf of the government, said that spending more than the original budget was always likely but that the scale of the underestimate was far greater than could reasonably be expected.

“Revision of cost estimates on a scale as radical as that which we have seen in relation to the 2012 Games has been damaging to confidence in the management of the overall program,” the report added.

“It has also exposed the government and games organisers to the charge that the initial bid was kept artificially low in order to win public support.”

The report endorsed the view of the government’s national audit office, which monitors public spending, that the latest estimate — announced by Olympic Minister Tessa Jowell in March 2007 — “represents a significant step forward in putting the games on a sound financial footing.”

But it pointed out that the budget included almost 3 billion pounds ($5.9 billion) for contingencies, so the figure was an absolute maximum.

“The priority now should be to ensure that the 9.325 billion pound funding package for the games does not become a budget to be spent in its entirety,” the report said. “The mark of success in financial management of the Games will be to have kept expenditure to a level comfortably below the 9.325 billion pound ceiling.”—AP