Celebrations over and ‘hard graft’ begins
Sebastian Coe has pledged to get down to the “hard graft” of preparing for a successful London Olympic Games in 2012.
The news that the capital would be holding the games in seven years time, after beating favourites Paris in a tense vote, was greeted by celebrations across Britain.
But bid chairman Lord Coe promised last night that there would be no let-up and he would ensure all the necessary work was done to ensure the games would be remembered for the right reasons.
Alluding to the problems that beset Athens in its build-up to hosting the Olympics last year and the logistical problems Atlanta faced in 1996, Lord Coe promised to “start early” on getting the city ready.
“Over the next 100 days there are some pretty serious timelines to meet,” he said.
“I think we’ve learned pretty well from previous games and previous organisations that we really do have to start early.”
He added: “These are the brief glamour days. There’s now real hard graft ahead over the next seven years, and particularly the next six months.”
Prime minister Tony Blair expressed his delight soon after the announcement, saying it was not often in his job that he received news that made him “punch the air and do a little jig”.
And those sentiments were put into action soon after, when it was announced that culture secretary Tessa Jowell would be appointed Olympics minister to oversee the process of developing an Olympic city.
Speaking after the vote, Ms Jowell said the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) decision to award London the games ensured sport would now be “completely central to government policy”.
She used the example of the 30 children from east London, which is set to benefit most from the games and will boast the main Olympic village, who had travelled to Singapore with the London 2012 bid team.
“I said: ‘So how many of you are going to go for gold medals?’ They all put up their hands. That’s what this is for,” she said.
