Still a lot of questions over 'legacy'
, the former Sports Minister, caused huge controversy during London's bid for the 2012 Olympics when she claimed Paris deserved the Games more than Britain.
Today, the Labour MP has given an which is likely to anger 2012 officials even more.
The big Olympic issue at the moment is legacy; what is going to be left for both Londoners and the rest of the UK when the Olympic party is over.
Hoey has attacked the Government for forgetting the promises made about changing the sporting face of Britain when in Singapore in 2005. Remember the emotional film about inspiring children worldwide to take up sport.
She even claims that London chairman Lord Coe regrets using the word 'legacy'.
as saying: "Two years ago I spoke to Seb about legacy. He said, Kate, I wish I had never used word (sic) legacy'."
I'd be surprised if Coe doesn't deny this conversation. The double Olympic champion is always talking about how he wants the Games to change the lives of kids and to provide unprecedented sports facilities for London, which is way behind most cities in the UK.
I'd love to be a fly on the wall when London Mayor Boris Johnson next sits down with Seb Coe on the 2012 board. Hoey is Johnson's sports commissioner who is responsible for helping to deliver 2012 grass roots legacy.
Does she have a point, though?
I always believed Hoey's argument on Paris during the bid was weak. Olympic bidding isn't about who deserves the Games otherwise Paris would have won on determination alone, having bid twice before. The French do have better sports facilities but the Games would not have had the same impact on the French capital as they are already having on London.
But some would say she has a point on legacy. Is it really as joined up as the Government keeps telling us? Are we using the Games enough to inspire kids up and down the country to take up sport? And what about the Olympic Park? Is it really going to be a great legacy for London? We still don't know what will happen to the main stadium.
I'm ´óÏó´«Ã½ London's Olympics Correspondent, which means I report on every aspect of the preparations for 2012. I'm going to be telling you what people are saying about London's preparations - both in the Olympic corridors of power and on the streets of the capital - and I want to hear your views.
Comment number 1.
At 9th Mar 2010, gdodds wrote:Legacy, regeneration of Stratford? Does that count?
New sports facilites for communities? Velodrome, the tennis facilities at Eton Manor, an athletics stadium (i'm sure that will eventually be the Olympic Stadium legacy), an olympic sized swimming pool.
I think London will have a perfectly good legacy actually.
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Comment number 2.
At 9th Mar 2010, Tiger Rose wrote:Kate Hoey always strikes me as one of those back bench MPs who is a bit of a rent a quote - always getting her name in the papers for saying something controversial.
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Comment number 3.
At 10th Mar 2010, Mr Reasonable wrote:Kate Hoey is spot on. My recollection of the bid was that it made clear commitments was about getting many more youngsters playing sport. Currently the legacy all seems to be about a few very large and expensive facilities, and the future of the main stadium is unclear. For the cost of the aquatic centre we could have built 100, 25 metre community swimming pools in the capital. Now that really would have kick started growth in sports participation. I'm afraid the Olympics has lost sight of what it is all about and has become an entirely corporate battle of global brands, media rights, sponsorship and construction contracts. The people of London, particularly, those in the outer London boroughs, who already have poor sports facilities, stand to gain absolutely nothing from the olympics legacy.
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Comment number 4.
At 26th Mar 2010, Simon Sonic wrote:How spot on you are MrReasonable. The Baghdad Bully, otherwise known as Zaha Hadid the Architect responsible for the monument to her own ego, has included the use of Red Louro as the timber to clad the Aquatics centre. First of all this is a BRAZILIAN HARDWOOD - Didn't Tony Blair say this was going to be the greenest Olympics ever??? Not only is the timber a hardwood and from South America, it is very very expensive.
So well done Zaha, you've helped cut down the rain forest because that's where it comes from and you've successfully polluted the atmosphere by bringing it half way round the world and not only that you've wasted an enormous amount of money in creating a building that looks like a dead halibut.
But at least you've satisfied your ego.
Shame about the rain forest.
Shame about the pollution,
Could have used local Larch from Scotland?
And then we'd really have enough money to build, as Mr Reasonable suggests, real pools for kids to learn to swim, cheaply, they could keep fit, enjoy themselves and keep the pounds off and themselves out of the health clinics.
Now that's an idea Zaha, perhaps you go go swimming to keep some..... no, perhaps not.
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