Lovely stuff.

When was that?

Yesterday, at Keighley.

Oh that's pedantic!

Rhinos blame YCC for the farce yesterday. Today YCC blame the Torch Relay officials www.therhinos.co.uk/news/19642.php It seems there's a buck passing relay going on as well

Rhinos blame YCC for the farce yesterday. Today YCC blame the Torch Relay officials www.therhinos.co.uk/news/19642.php It seems there's a buck passing relay going on as well

I was too late for the Bramley home game so got off at Headingley instead. And yes, I did then start to think about the whipping boy SL rabble opposition and whether they (or Leeds for that matter) justified a £20 admission price. I concluded that neither did. Was I wrong?

Don't forget your RL off-season next year - it's during the World Cup.


I prefer Keith... or Bill.

Odd

I'll just write this number down...

£10,000,000,000

How many footballs, rugby balls, full team kits, cricket bats, wickets, balls, whitewash for marking running tracks, etc etc etc could Seth and his team buy to promote more sports in schools with that sort of money ?

Because that seems to be the only vindication offered.

Well done.

Was there any reason you did that?

The paucity of the argument in favour of hosting the Olympics is never more obvious than when those not in favour are labelled as miserable fekkers. I too have a real issue with £10 billion worth of public funds being wasted on such a non-event in the same way as I had a real issue with the huge waste of public funds on that other non-event recently called the Queens Jubilee.

What would you like to see public money spent on?

And the Olympics is in no way a 'non-event'.

Yes, it was on the next two lines, didn't you get that far ?

I wonder how much due diligence the miserable fekkers have done as to the economic benefits of the Olympics in comparison to the costs?

Why have they concluded it will be another Montreal rather than a Los Angeles or Athens?

I wonder if they have read [url=http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~rosenl/sports%20Folder/Economic%20Impact%20of%20Olympics%20PWC.pdfthis report[/url? I suspect they haven't.

The Homeless and getting people into Work.

How many jobs do you think are created by hosting the Olympics, and how much income tax is paid on the earnings from those jobs?

I totally agree. But £10 Billion

Really, there was no way that these events could be put on for less? I would love to understand how much of the spend was about the sport and how much was about showing a very small minority a very good time. I am sure there will be many great legacy items, stadiums etc left behind after the events have finished. But £10 Billion, £10000000000.

You can a do an awful lot of good in the world for that kind of money.

Being of an intelligence that defies your handsome physique (you can't be both, its just not possible), you will of course understand that major projects like the Olympic Park are required by EU law to go out to tender to all EU countries ?

Now I don't suppose that HM Gov will ever release details of just how many non-uk companies are dipping their beaks in that £10billion pot but I know of one major sub-contractor from Ireland (the republic, not northern), who has done very nicely thanks you with two several-million deals on both the Olympic village and prior to that Wembley Stadium using their own Irish workforce, nett benefit to the UK economy would be a few boarding house proprietors and pubs/eateries, but any tax from profits and income will be going straight to the Irish Exchequer, and Ryanair.

Do ryanair not pay any duties or taxes in the UK? I would imagine they do, having so many hubs here.

Were materials all shipped in from Ireland? Were Irish delivery companies used?

Did you read the PWC report in my previous post?

Having read how a war-ravaged and still-on-rationing UK managed to put on an Olympics in 1948 (see [iThe Austerity Olympics[/i, Janie Hampton, Aurum Press), I'm certain it could have been done for a lot less.
Back then, they couldn't sell all the three shillings and sixpence tickets (*) to stand at the opening ceremony, so they gave the remainder away to schoolkids.

(*) 17.5 pence or, allowing for inflation, £5.23 now

Meh, i imagine most of the complainers about hosting the event would of complained just as much if we'd of lost out in the bidding asking why we aren't good enough to win hosting honours to such big events. Considering the bid was won in 2005 and therefore planned well in advance of that too you can't really use the current economic climate as too much of a weapon in your argument, what were they meant to do come 2009? Go to the Olympic Commitee and say ''sorry can we do this on a shoestring budget now?''. The only part that really bugged me was how it took 1 full year and £400,000 to come up with that rubbish logo, even if it had been a great logo how can it take so long and cost so much.

How many more real jobs could have been created by using this huge cost on a more long term infrastructrure project!

And I suppose the foolish feckers will believe that it will be a good thing that many more jobs will be created when they come to knock down the Olympic Stadium because it has no further real use ....some 'legacy'

The one that was published in 2004 ?

Yes, particularly page 24 in which PWC point out that its very difficult to predict beforehand whether or not any given Games would have produced a surplus or a deficit and those that show a surplus have "great uncertainties around many of the assumptions underlying the analysis" - and they even point out that the Olympics can produce an economic downturn after the event has finished.

Overall its a pretty inconclusive document casting all sorts of doubt on the voracity of the numbers produced for previous Games - indeed pointing to that years Athens Games for which the Greek Government were predicting a public contribution of €4.6 billion but PWC mention "could rise to €10 billion", how spooky is that, they also predict that the Greek economy could take a dive in 2005 because of their Olympic spending, hmmmm.

Lets not forget that, like Greece, the original London bid in 2004 had construction costs of £2.375 billion (they didn't mention that some of that would be going to Ireland), £1 billion in "regeneration" costs, and £700 million coming from the private sector, overall cost of £4 billion - by 2007 this had risen to £9.7billion, pretty much in line with the Athens model and pretty much in line with what PWC were predicting and in their prediction they emphasise how difficult it is to quantify any ongoing benefits.


If we are hoping at the least to leave a legacy of sporting endeavour among our children then bunging £10,000,000,000 at Seth's works would take us a long way down that path I'd guess, far more than 17 days of (often) minor sporting performances will do.

I guess it's wasted on us miserable lot. We've moaned more about the cost of this as a nation than we have about the cost of the Iraq war.

Olympics in London? It's like putting Disneyland in f****g Paris.

left after the match , home for sunday dinner & went to see the torch @ east end park. No waiting, no view blocked.

How do you create a real job with money and why aren't the jobs generated by the olympics real?

If my taxes are going to go to this creation of jobs I'd rather it be for something like the olympics than, for example, the arts or, as mentioned, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.