We were promised the greenest most ethical Olympics ever. A
look at the list of international sponsors showed that this would be an
impossible dream. And despite all the belief in the great god of "the
market" they still get exclusive rights in an area where we have also been
responsible for part of the funding through our Council tax. Then Dow
"Bhopal" Chemicals and Lloyds Bank, a suspect in the Libor rate
fixing scam were added as local sponsors.
It was promised that jobs on the site would be given to
local people. The Olympic Delivery Authority has argued that as this promise
was made by the bidding group, which is an entirely separate organisation, they
were not bound by it.
It was argued that it will increase participation in sport
yet they concreted over a large part of the greatest area of public football
pitches in the world. They say they will restore it afterwards but will the
funding to do this be available and you can safely bet some developer has his
eye on it.
There are still displaced small businesses that are waiting
for their compensation but that pot of money has been completely used up.
However, Olympic lanes or no Olympic lanes, next Friday is
the last Friday on the month and Critical Mass is still going ahead - after all
it has been happening on the last Friday of the month since long before Britain
decided to bid for the games.
On Saturday there is a demonstration against the corporate
Olympics assembling in Mile end Park at 12 noon, marching to Victoria Park
where there will be "People's games for all". http://www.counterolympicsnetwork.wordpress.com/.
The news is that Tower Hamlets council has withdrawn permission for this demo but it is
still going ahead.
Written by Peter Budge, Haringey Green Green Party
2 comments:
Good Info. yup there are lot of money transactions like this happens at big events and these local sponsers will never give up such great chances.
Link not quite working, a comma instead of a dot. Should be:
http://counterolympicsnetwork.wordpress.com/
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