West Ham Olympic Bid Collapses

Stoof said:

That's surely just a shot across the bows?

Don't fuck with us, eh?

And also, maybe a thank you for Scotty P. With a kiss. No! Two kisses.

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Scott Spur said:

OK are we sure that the £17M from Boris is still on the table? Am I right in thinking that DL told Boris to shove it last week?

If so, we have had the rug pulled squarely from under our feet and that would be why Karren Brady is so smug??

I'm probably missing something......??

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felmani26 said:

That may well be the case Sloth but it's still subjective.

To be quite frank, I don't care less if West Ham/Leyton Orient/whoever actually become tennants in the OS, i'm just trying to ascertain what leverage we now have in trying to get some form of significant subsidy for the NDP from the implications of today's events.

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sloth said:

Looks to me that West Ham will get the same deal just phrased slightly differently. Basically the public will fund the conversion rather than the public giving the money to West Ham to do the conversion. West Ham, if they want to do the improvements (roof, exec boxes), will have to find the funding from somewhere to do them, but seeing as our challenge was about government subsidy in a competitive bidding process, presumably once it's no longer a bidding process West Ham will be able to return to Newham and secure the loan under the same terms?

Thereafter it will be a simple measure for West Ham to offer to take on the stadium permanently in exchange for certain guarantees. They'll sell the Naming Rights and in five or ten years when there are no more large athletics events on the horizon and the public are desperate for something anything to be done to take the burden from the public purse of the OS West Ham will sell up to a billionaire who will pay £100m or so to the public coffers in return for being able to rip up the track and start again.

I'd say we've been left high and dry on this one. We've no chance of levering more money out of the Mayor's office and so it's decision time for Levy and co. Is the NDP viable as it is or not? Though I guess we've still to find out what happens with our bid to the RGF (sadly that's chaired by Michael Heseltine and I can well imagine a quick telephone call from his Tory chum Boris could scupper that one).

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worcestersauce said:

So let me understand this, the Cockney rent boys(CRB's) sell their ground put the money in the high yield account whilst paying a peppercorn rent in the OS during which time the stadium will be modified and a huge debt built up whereupon the CRB's will come riding in like white knights to take over the stadium wiping out the debt on the OPLC who will be so grateful that they'll ok the removal of the running track.
I think I've got that right.

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Spurs1960 said:

It won't be their stadium to convert how they like, they will have to rent it so any improvements (i.e executive boxes) are down to the owners not West Ham.

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SpurSince57 said:

We can hardly cry 'Foul!' over Newham's subsidy to the Spammers and then expect public funds ourselves.

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sloth said:

Nothing wrong with public subsidy for private companies per se. It's just you can't subsidise with public money one private company over another in a competitive tendering process.

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worcestersauce said:

We can when the public funds they are making available would be available if West Ham wanted to help regenerate Tottenham High road unlike Newhams subsidy was only made available to West Ham. Not that they are being made directly to us anyway.

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piedpiper said:

my reading of the statement on our OS suggests that we still believe our offer was the best for the stadium. meaning that we believe our offer is the most credible and that we are still interested based on our terms of a stadium without a track and us building one with a track in crystal palace. i do not see this as confirmation that the NLDP is on, as Levy once mentioned it was not viable as a result of the costs involved.

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sherbornespurs said:

I can see why an initial short term lease of perhaps one or two years for the Olympic stadium would make sense.

The government, particularly a Tory one, won't entertain the stadium being in public ownership for any longer than is absolutely necessary - they'll want it handed over to the 'free market' as soon as humanly possible.

The intriguing thing is what happens to the stadium infrastructure in the long term, and I guess this may depend on whether London gets the 2017 World Athletic games.

Let's face it, after 2012 the UK probably won't stage another olympics for a hundred years, the same would be true if London is awarded the 2017 World Athletic games.

Given that these are the only two athletics events that could ever hope to fill an 80,000/60,000 capacity stadium there is absolutely no reason to retain a running track after the 2017 games, should they be awarded to London. If the running track was retained thereafter it would be at this point the stadium would become the 'White Elephant' that people talk about, every other athletics meeting could be held easily at either Crystal Palace, Birmingham or Gateshead with capacity to spare.

I seriously think the long term future of the running track will be put on the back burner, certainly until after London has held the World Athletics games (whether it's 2017 or later).

To summarise; let's put in that claim for compensation of costs for what turned out be a deeply flawed proces - and get on with building our new stadium in N17.

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HodisGawd said:

This is a complete mess for everyone now and the whole thing stinks of back-room deals and disagreements between Boris, Levy, OPLC and West Ham.

And make no mistake, it's all Seb Coe's fault.

Why he insists on an athletics legacy no-one wants is beyond me. Without that proviso there could be a proper bidding process and a future for the park, but with it it's so obviously going to be a disaster for the whole country.

Remember what Darren Campbell came out against the UK Athletics party line and said before? He was spot on. Athletics will struggle to fill the original plan for a stadium reduced to 25,000, let alone 60,000. People simply don't give a shit about people running round a track because the sport is simply NOT AS GOOD as football. It will never replace football Mr Coe. Never. This is all just an ego trip for him. He's delusional and the whole idea is ridiculous. They should have taken our offer to develop Crystal Palace. Know your place athletics, behind football, cricket, rugby, bowls croquet and two weeks of rain-affected tennis a year.

So, what happened today was that they re-opened the bidding process to make it fair again. Except it isn't, they've just shifted the goalposts. Today, Hugh Robertson basically said West Ham will win the new contract. He didn't say it, but everyone knew what he meant. And they will.

Yes, West Ham will get a good financial deal but the stadium they get will be even crapper than it was going to be. It'll be cheap. It's cheap now but it'll be cheaper then and totally soulless. They won't have control over it and it won't be the home of West Ham.

Yet if they didn't add the track proviso we would win the bid and build a great stadium there.

Here's a couple of things to consider:

- the way in is through the Westfield shopping centre. 25,000 pissed up West Ham fans walking through there every Saturday - is this a good idea?
- West Ham are £110m in debt
- The stadium was designed to be temporary. They've made a big deal about it being awesome but it isn't, it's crap. It's a cheap, pop-up stadium that only came on budget because they made cutbacks. This is what West Ham will get


Notice they've changed the new terms - is that something to do with Daniel Levy's insistence on a guarantee to keep the running track? Did they realise they couldn't hold West Ham to that with old deal and think "Oh shit we fucked up?". Probably. Also, Boris has probably

The idea of going to Stratford is dead for us. When I first heard about 6.30 this morning I wondered what West Ham would do. But then they came straight out and said they'd bid, which surprised me. Have they weighed this up properly? Really?

Anyway, Stratford is dead for us now West Ham are going for it again. We might have some of our costs offset by Boris (that was all it was folks, we weren't being given £17m as reported) but that's all.

The only good thing for us is that this could turn out to be even more of a disaster than it inevitably was going to be for West Ham.

For that at least, and for exposing this stitch-up of a proceedure for what it is, for fighting for every penny of our money and making Seb Coe, Boris and those little poisoned porn barons sweat, Daniel Levy should be APPLAUDED.

Oh, I forgot, he made Karen Brady look like the ditzy brainless stereotype she's always so desperate to tell us she's not, which was great.

To supporters of other clubs and the general public I think we look really bad as if we've whinged and whined about a public subsidy and been bad losers, but if you take any interest in this (I read every word on it) I think you've got to say we've really shaken up the establishment with this.

Fuck the Olympics, I'll be more interested in the transfer gossip next summer. And as for Olympic football...

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ethanedwards said:

Excellent post mate, Coe is one smug **** , about time so called journalists did some factual reporting rather than fawning around Boris, Coe etc.

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sloth said:

Apparently not so. Can't remember where I read it this morning, but West Ham will be responsible for/expected (and allowed) to make the necessary changes to make it suitable for Premiership football. They'll have to pay though.

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shelfsidespur said:

If DL really wants the Olympic Stadium then the strategy must be obvious. We could win this in the court of Public Opinion.

i) DL does the sums and makes our best offer for the stadium plus a proper rebuild of Crystal Palace.

ii) DL briefs the press. Our offer generates X hundred million for the taxpayer and provides proper athletics facilties. Latest proposal mooted for a new tender process involves minimal recoveyr of the supposed £500m spend and the rental is not guaranteed, nor would it cover the interest lost on the taxpayers debt.
iii) In the current desperate economic crisis how could the Government justify turning down our offer when they are closing hospitals for the sake of a few million. Surely the press would have to be on our side.

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