London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Bill

My Lords, I was able to make a note saying that I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Valentine, will make an enormous contribution to the work of this House based not just on her speech today but on the evidence of our encounters over a long period. She appeared not even to need the security blanket of a set of notes. I find that not only admirable but truly astonishing. She may have noticed that the rest of us are clutching pieces of paper. Where each of us was at 12.47 on 6 June 2006 may be a question that we ask, and exchange anecdotes on, for some time. I declare an interest in that I am the chair of the London Assembly, which incidentally means that I wear the badge that Tony Banks once wore. Because of that, I was in the press gallery at City Hall. A radio station wanted me there for a live reaction to the announcement, whatever it was to be. When it happened, the producer back in the studio was so excited that he forgot about it. I say to my noble friend Lord Addington and to the noble Baroness, Lady Billingham, that I was undignified. I did not leap—I do not do leaping—but I did shout, somewhat to my own surprise. Like many others, I did not know until that moment quite how much I cared, nor, indeed, how patriotic I felt about the Games. Being in a position to see the Red Arrows flying over London just after the announcement rather consolidated that feeling. Over the next six or seven years, those who ask the most penetrating questions about the Games will be not the Games’ opponents, detractors or Cassandras but those who care most about making them a huge success. I include in that our own two Olympians and other athletes, who must know a thing or two about careful and determined preparation. I refer to the success of the Games in all their aspects—the Olympics, the Paralympics, the cultural Olympics and their legacy. Discussion about the Paralympics is often, if not an afterthought, at least a second thought, so I thought that I might start with them because London led the way in 1948, I understand. I only recently discovered that they are in fact the parallel Olympics and they came about because doctors in London were advocating the benefits of exercise for those who were coping with war injuries. London has a great opportunity to distinguish itself again in ensuring that the facilities, the venues and the transport are fully accessible—I stress the word ““fully””. That, as my noble friend Lord Addington said, will have the incidental benefit of making things very much easier not for those who come within what most of us might think of as ““disabled”” but for those who hesitate because they have minor mobility problems, those who have young children and many more. London, I believe, must facilitate the Olympic Games as a spectator sport for people who have disabilities and the Paralympics as a spectator sport for able-bodied people, as well as vice versa. With regard to success in making people aware of the Paralympics, a great deal is owed to our own Paralympic athletes, who are very much a part of the bid. It also occurred to me to pay credit to the BBC, one of whose idents—I thought of them as interludes—feature wheelchair users in the red-themed advertisements. I am sure that we will look at this in detail in Committee, but I wondered why the section of the GLA Act which imposes a requirement to have regard to promotion of equality of opportunity and has anti-discrimination provisions is not imposed not just on the ODA but on TfL and the LDA. There may be historical reasons for that. Modern legislation also includes sustainability duties and, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, said, we may well wish to explore in detail in Committee what is in the Bill now in that regard. The Mayor has said that these will be the greenest Games ever, and the way in which the Games are delivered, both with regard to disability issues and sustainability, will profoundly affect what is delivered. So, rightly, we are all interested in the how as well as the what. Volunteers will be queuing up to be involved. That was one of the successes of the Manchester Commonwealth Games. The culture of volunteering is one of huge potential legacies. I understand that more than 70,000 expressions of interest have already been made. These people are a resource for organisations in the run-up. The day when we were originally to have debated the Second Reading of the Bill, I read about an organisation called the Africa Foundation Stone, which received £1,000—a tiny amount in this context—from Volunteer 2012 to hold an Olympic-themed event, a football tournament for young people. The group was formed five years ago by refugees from the Congo who aim to break down the barriers facing Africans living in east London. Sport is a tool, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, was saying. That is just the sort of example to inspire us and show the benefits that can be reaped. There are also hundreds of community groups in the area with the potential to play a part in the cultural Olympics. We have not had any mention of those tonight. There is no mention of them in the Bill; I hope there is no significance in that. To succeed—I echo the noble Baronesses, Lady Thornton and Lady Valentine—the community as a whole and local communities need to be taken along with the preparation for the Games and the establishment of a legacy. We cannot have people saying, as some said of Manchester, that they did not get the maximum benefit because they did not feel that the organisers of the Games tried to incorporate opportunities for local businesses into their planning. That was the Federation of Small Businesses, and I should say that it was not a universally shared view, but it is, perhaps, a warning. There is a responsibility—I put it that highly—to create jobs for, and to skill, local people. None of that can be understated. I take the view that the ODA needs to set targets for the employment of local people, the granting of contracts to small and medium-sized enterprises, to BME and indeed to women-led businesses right from the start. I do not underestimate the difficulties, but assisting such businesses to bid—providing information, helping them through the tendering process—is hugely important. I commend what the LDA is doing thus far, but it is going to have to do a great deal and be very imaginative if it is to fulfil a role as champion for the area. There has inevitably been much scepticism over the cost of the Games, and that has been shared tonight. People keep asking whether the Games will be delivered on time and to budget. Asking whether they will be delivered on time is a nonsense, because if they are not on time, they will not be delivered. Perhaps, however, I am not the only person who has heard the story of the noble Lord, Lord Coe, about the Greek workman who said that there was no need to worry about the completion of the stadium in Athens if the opening ceremony was not going to be until the evening. Openness on the budget, as well as keeping it under control, is essential. I may be hampered by being a lawyer, but I am not as reassured as others have been—or as the Mayor tells me I should be—that the memorandum of understanding between the Mayor and the Government protects London council tax payers. The paragraph in what is quite a short agreement—even as a lawyer, I congratulate them on that—says that it means the ““expectation”” of Ministers and the Mayor is that the amounts set out in the memorandum be met by the National Lottery and council tax precept, and that the LDA will continue to be available should it be required; and that Ministers and the Mayor agree to ““review”” the arrangements. That, to me, is an agreement to agree, not any sort of guarantee. There is much reliance, as noble Lords have said, on the lottery. There must be uncertainties in a changing economic situation about how much the lottery can be expected to raise. I understand that the scratch card—which was printed initially in Atlanta, but now moved to Leeds—did not enjoy as much success as had been hoped for, so there is ground already to be made up. The amount paid by London council tax payers will be very topical during the next couple of months as the first precept is received. Wearing my London Assembly hat, I am keen that we ensure that what Londoners and others on their behalf pay is what they thought they had signed up to when they sent all those texts and e-mails in support; that is, £20 a year at band D for 10 or perhaps 12 years. If other costs are associated with the Games—I say that there are because £500,000 has already been allocated in the core GLA budget for associated costs next year—they should be made absolutely clear, because we all ought to know what is needed. The London Assembly has already asked the Mayor and the LDA a lot of questions—constructively, I hope—and I assure the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, that if any proposal is made to take over the Centre Court at Wimbledon, we will be on to it. I suspect that it will not get permission for capital funding. We have had also a useful correspondence with the Minister for Sport about the role of the Assembly, and I will seek in Committee to be very precise about this. For now, I shall say simply that I am very keen that the Assembly has the powers as well as the will to play a full part in scrutinising the London bodies involved and their London activities, including the ODA. Although I do not doubt the Government’s good intentions, I observe that their control of the ODA is enormous. The Secretary of State appoints not just the chair and all the members, but the chief executive, the finance director and the director of transport. Are the Government paranoid, or is it me? Despite all those powers of appointment and dismissal, Clause 23(6) states that the ODA must go on with versions of its strategy,"““until it obtains the Secretary of State’s approval””," or, in the vernacular, it gets it right. And the Secretary of State still has powers of direction. There must be openness in the way the ODA operates. We have had the report of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. Although it does not make any negative comments on the Bill, we have seen the memo from the Department for Constitutional Affairs. That draws attention to the large number of delegated powers, which mean that there will be a large number of instances where Parliament can be involved and say yes or no, but cannot amend what the Government propose. I continue the theme of clarity, but turn to transport. The London boroughs are concerned to know the likely extent of the Olympic route network—the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, touched on that; the extent to which measures such as Olympic lanes will be imposed; the extent to which they are necessary; and when the ODA’s traffic powers will start. I do not need to repeat what my noble friend had to ask about transport, but the points that he made about the lead-in time are those which the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, made and we need to explore them. It is inevitable that one will sound negative when speaking on a Bill at this stage, but we have a job to do. The Olympic Games and Paralympic Games should stretch our horizons. They are about a ““can do”” attitude. We will do it; we will do it very well. The amendments from these Benches and, I am sure, from around the House will be designed to contribute to that.