• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

Could you tell us about the work you are doing, if any, to ensure that while, currently, Government is very focused, like being dazzled by headlights, on cost issues, it remains equally focused on the regeneration, the economic wealth creation of the United Kingdom, as well as London, issues flowing from the Games? Maybe other guests could add to that as well.

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

One final question then, just to bring it back to London level, and maybe just look at East London as an example, but I think this refers to other Members concerns. Within my constituency I have Newham, Tower Hamlets, obviously beneficiaries from the Games, but Barking and Dagenham as well, who, although they are very positive, are a little bit grumpy as well. They are saying all the action is down the road there. How does the economic model that the LDA and others are working to really benefit us in other parts of London? And, I take it that...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

That was an easy question, obviously. Try a harder one. Do you have what I might call an economic model as to how the Olympic Games will integrate with the wider regeneration of the area, and how you might, as the LDA, reach into those, harder-to-reach groups? I think giving email lists of 50 names is dramatic, it is maybe a press release, but it is not really a way of doing that.

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

On this issue of economic boost, clearly it would give London and economic boost if we committed to a living wage for all the workers. Is this going to be -- I know the ODA is working with London citizens to ease this forward. Is this going to be living wage Olympics? Are we going to be globally embarrassed?

• Question by: Andrew Pelling
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

I am very grateful for Mr Biggs mentioning Croydon and Sutton, and I will just briefly touch on that in the limited time that I have. Recently the Department for Work and Pensions came up with figures for Croydon Central Parliamentary Constituency. It is 14th in terms of number of lone parents who are on income support, so there is a very real need to recognise the importance of investing in this area in terms of social deprivation. But my question is actually about the question which Mr Biggs has down about the economic development impact. I would declare an...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

Many of my constituents in East London are enterprising, go getting kids, who are improving their school standards. People are making enormous progress, but there are various communities that are stuck. Would you agree with me that it is actually rather naïve of people - not that any are in this room, of course - to think that the Olympic Games will in some way solve all of those entrenched problems in one fell swoop? In other words, the Olympic Games are part of a big process that will last, in some cases, several generations, I think, before we sort...

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

If I turn to other areas, you mentioned - Sydney and Athens, and so on. My problem with the situation is, if you look at Athens, and, five years earlier, at a lot of the other venues, and with things like rowing and so on, these things were promised to be legacy. If you look at all the original stuff, it said, `this will be legacy'. But the rowing area now has, sort of, environmentally despoiled a wetlands area. The problem is, I cannot find any situation where I can trust claims. It all seems very pie in the sky...

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 15 February 2007

All right, David. One thing that I am a bit concerned about is that, if you look, for example, at the actual stadium and you look at the original quote of £280 million, the Government has now acknowledged it will be higher than that because of the fact that you want a legacy from it; you do not just want a temporary 80,000 seat stadium. Now, the problem is that that tends to indicate to me that no account initially was taken of a possible legacy use, so therefore there is at least another £100 million in costs. Ignore the...

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 17 January 2007

If it were removed, how helpful would that be? Say it were removed next year, how helpful would that be to the London Pensions Fund?

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 17 January 2007

I think the main point is that if we do have even minor falls this ongoing amount of money taken from pensioners in Britain will have an impact. Do you still have forecasts and estimates for what will happen ongoing, say over the next five to ten years as a result of it?