London 2012 Olympics: Charities who lost funding to pay for the Games ‘won’t see their money for another decade’

Money diverted from charity funding to pay towards the cost of the London 2012 Olympics will not be returned to hard-pressed voluntary groups until the mid-2020s, it has emerged.

Lottery revenues worth £675 million were re-allocated from charities towards the Olympic in 2007, on the understanding the money would be returned to its originally intended recipients shortly after the end of the games, using the proceeds from the selling off of Olympic assets.

But ministers have now said that the money will not be returned for at least another decade.

Dozens of charities, including the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services and Mencap, have now joined forces, under an umbrella group called the Big Lottery Refund, to campaign for the money to be returned far sooner, claiming they face financial disaster without it.

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Filed under: campaigns, finance

CounterOlympics first video production

CounterOlympics first video production! A film made by Kostas Deligiannidis, Mike Wells and Julian Cheyne.

The true cost of the London Olympics will only be known after the Games are over.

The original budget of £2.4billion may now have risen ten times to £24billion.

The Games are not ‘within’ budget’ and many costs such as the acquisition of the land, the remediation, spending by government departments and quangos are not included in the revised budget of £9.34billion

The ‘opportunity costs’ of spending £24billion could have gone a long way to saving Britain from the Tory austerity shock doctrine

Filed under: film, finance, Olympic legacy, the problem with the Olympics