UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 162-ii

House of COMMONS

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE

TAKEN BEFORE

WELSH AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

The potential benefits of the 2012 Olympics

and Paralympics for Wales

Tuesday 27 January 2009

RT HON TESSA JOWELL MP and MR ALAN BUCKNALL

Evidence heard in Public Questions 59 - 128

USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT

Oral Evidence

Taken before the Welsh Affairs Committee

on Tuesday 27 January 2009

Members present

Dr Hywel Francis, in the Chair

Mr David Jones

Alun Michael

Mark Pritchard

Hywel Williams

Mark Williams

________________

Memorandum submitted by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses: Rt Hon Tessa Jowell MP, Minister for the Olympics, Department of Culture, Media and Sport, and Mr Alan Bucknall, Head of Olympic Legacy, Government Olympic Executive, gave evidence.

Q59 Chairman: Good morning. Bora da. Welcome to the Welsh Affairs Committee. For the record, Minister, could you introduce yourself and your colleague?

Tessa Jowell: Thank you very much, Chairman. I am Tessa Jowell, I am Minister for the Olympics and Paymaster General, and my colleague, Alan Bucknall, from the Government Olympic Executive, is the Director of UK Legacy.

Q60 Chairman: Could I also say, for the record, that we had a very productive evidence session in Neath Port Talbot last week, where we had the Welsh Minister, Alun Ffred Jones, before us and his colleague, sporting bodies involved in the Olympics and Paralympics and some athletes as well. It was a very positive and upbeat meeting.

Tessa Jowell: Good. I am very glad.

Q61 Chairman: Could I begin by asking you, Minister, first of all, a very general question about the benefits of the 2012 Olympic Games. How will they be of benefit in Wales?

Tessa Jowell: I think the possibility for benefit is very great, and Wales is already beginning to realise some of that through the opportunities to host visiting national Olympic committees, their teams and through the provision of training camps and acclimatisation and preparation facilities. Throughout Wales there are some 36 camps which are part of the online schedule which the Organising Committee published in the summer. I think there is a very great opportunity for the local authorities, for champions within Wales to be very proactive in encouraging other national Olympic committees to come and use the facilities. You will be, obviously, delighted that the Australian Paralympic team have decided that they are going to use the facilities in Cardiff. So that is the first point. The second is through the potential to bid for Olympic related contracts directly and through the supply chain. Our feeling - and this has been reflected in some of the Parliamentary answers that I have provided - is that there is still an enormous amount more that Welsh business could be doing in order to benefit from the potential investment. There is still another £500 million worth of work to be contracted, and a week-and-a-half ago we announced that those supply chain contracts would be liable, also, to mandating of a requirement to provide apprenticeships and training opportunities. So that is very important for an economy like that of Wales which is changing. Obviously, we have to record concern at the Corus job losses that were reported yesterday. So there is considerable opportunity. One thousand Welsh businesses have registered as part of the electronic brokerage network, but I think only four contracts have actually been awarded to Welsh businesses. Obviously, we are making an enormous effort to try to ensure that the benefits of this, potentially, up to £8.1 billion of investment for the development of the Olympic Park are actually available right round the UK. What we will be very happy to do is to ensure that the Olympic Delivery Authority meet with the Welsh business support services to see whether more can be done to support Welsh businesses in utilising this opportunity. However, there is a point where there is a limit to anything that we can actually determine centrally, but I would record that Wales' registrations are 2% of the total number of registrations on the CompeteFor network, and, as I say, the direct contracts are only in the region of about four. That is very substantially less than I think you would be hoping for. Four businesses registered in Wales have won work supplying the Olympic Delivery Authority.

Chairman: We can see a number of supplementary questions queuing up here.

Q62 Mark Pritchard: Good morning, Minister. You have mentioned "a lot more Welsh businesses could be doing more". Do you think, given that small, medium-sized and large businesses are struggling in Wales - people are being laid off; people are losing their jobs - that the Government have got their priorities wrong when a senior Minister is saying they should be doing more for the Olympics?

Tessa Jowell: Let me be clear on what I mean by that: it is not businesses doing more for the Olympics but maximising the benefit that the Olympics can bring. This is a £6.1 billion investment in the economy of the UK, and one of the reasons that the ODA have gone to the efforts they have in creating the electronic brokerage system of notifying businesses that contracts are available, tenders are being invited, and, also, facilitating the linking of firms who may of themselves be too small to be credible competitors with other relevant businesses, is because we are maximising the opportunity for that benefit to be spread and providing direct assistance and help to precisely those businesses, even more so because we recognise the pressure that they are under and the extent to which they are struggling.

Q63 Mr Jones: Good morning, Minister. You tell us that four contracts have so far been awarded to Welsh businesses. Are you able to tell us the value of those contracts?

Tessa Jowell: It runs to thousands of pounds rather than millions of pounds, but we also expect that (and, again, Chairman, I am very happy to provide you with the information when it is available) by round about Easter the ODA will be able to provide us with a more precise estimate of the supply chain value of contracts that have been led, that do not necessarily show up in these headline figures. You will understand the complexity of this but we expect those figures to show the value to Wales to be very substantially more.

Q64 Mr Jones: You say thousands rather than millions?

Tessa Jowell: Yes.

Q65 Mr Jones: Are you talking about the low thousands, or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands?

Tessa Jowell: I think it is tens of thousands.

Q66 Hywel Williams: Good morning, Minister. Delivering the Olympics will be a very complicated affair. Do you have a robust system for identifying and then accounting for any contracts directly to Wales or indirectly through sub-contracting? If you have such a system, can you undertake to give this Committee regular reports in respect of the number and also the value of contracts let with Welsh companies?

Tessa Jowell: The Olympic Delivery Authority does have a record of, obviously, all the businesses and where they are that win contracts. What sometimes complicates that picture is where you have, perhaps, an English based company that has subsidiaries in their suppliers in Wales or Scotland or Northern Ireland. We are seeking to refine that information so that we have an accurate picture of the value of Olympic investment that is going into the Welsh economy. What I want to underline is the importance we attach to the UK-wide benefit from this investment; that businesses who are struggling should derive benefit from this Olympic investment. We need to be able to show you through our recording how that investment is going. So we can give you the information now that 1,000 businesses are registered on the electronic network for contracts (and, as I have explained, fairly small contracts awarded) and offer to ask the ODA to go and talk to the business support network to see what more help can be provided to encourage more of those 1,000 businesses - perhaps with linked bids with other companies. The final point is that round about Easter we will be able to supply you with the larger figure that will demonstrate the supply chain benefit to the Welsh economy.

Q67 Hywel Williams: Could you file regular reports in the future, in that there is another three years to go, and hopefully we will be focused and it would be good if this Committee could be involved?

Tessa Jowell: I would be delighted to do that. Obviously, this is the period of maximum activity on tendering, but there will be further contracts once the staging phase begins to tender for work. I would be delighted to update the Committee on the Welsh companies that are benefiting.

Q68 Mark Pritchard: Minister, you mentioned UK-wide benefits but is not the story of the Olympics in the United Kingdom developing into the narrative disbenefits? One example in Wales is that recently in the Welsh Assembly, as you probably know, your counterpart in Wales, suggested that up to £100 million of Lottery funding could be diverted away from good causes and other worthy organisations in Wales as a result of a lack of private capital and investment in the Olympic projects. What do you say to those organisations that might have to close or, certainly, suffer as a result of not receiving that Lottery funding?

Tessa Jowell: The figure for Wales is about £65 million, not £100 million. That is the first point.

Q69 Mark Pritchard: Is that an acceptable figure, do you think?

Tessa Jowell: It is a figure which recognises the fact that for the period of the Olympic Games there is a good cause, which is the Olympic Games, just as the Millennium was an additional good cause for a period of time. The Olympics is a national event and, undoubtedly, London derives the greatest benefit but I hope that what you will recognise from the evidence I will give you this morning are the concerted efforts that are being made to ensure that the benefits are spread UK-wide. So a decision was taken that the Lottery would be a major contributor. The Lottery is contributing about 23% of the overall cost. Of course, 64% is coming from the Exchequer (the taxpayer), 23% is coming from the Lottery, and the remainder is coming from London. So those are the proportions and, no, I do not think that it is unreasonable. Secondly, the way in which we have structured the Lottery contribution makes it absolutely clear that there will be no further take from the Lottery and, indeed, once the land in the Olympic Park begins to be sold after the Games then there will be a return to the Lottery of up to the £675 million that will be diverted from 2010 onwards.

Q70 Mark Pritchard: Given the credit crunch, do you think you would have failed as a Minister for the Olympic if there is an increase either in the public sector funding or an increase in taking further funds away from the National Lottery?

Tessa Jowell: There will not be any further call on London or the Lottery, and both I and the relevant subsequent Secretaries of State have made that absolutely clear. In relation to the overall budget, the budget is £9.325 billion and the impact on the Lottery is not because of loss of private sector equity as a result of the credit crunch; the impact on the Lottery is an impact that was determined as part of the original funding package. So the impact on the loss of private sector equity for two of the projects - the Olympic Village and the press and broadcast centre - is being met from the contingency, and there is sufficient provision within the contingency to cover that.

Q71 Mark Pritchard: I have one, final softer question for you, if I may. It seems that everybody is suffering from the credit crunch and having to make very difficult decisions as a result of that. You seem to be telling the Committee today, unless I have mistaken your replies, that despite the credit crunch nothing is really going to change, that you are on course and it has not impacted on the delivery of the Olympics. To me that sounds strange because you will probably be the only department in government that really is not suffering as a result of the credit crunch.

Tessa Jowell: Let me just set out very briefly what the position is. We have a budget of £9.325 billion and that budget is subject to day-in, day-out scrutiny for cost savings, and the flexible use of the contingency is praised by the National Audit Office. We publish the figures on a quarterly basis in order to maximise transparency. We have every reason to be confident that the budget will be sufficient for the construction needs and the other commitments that that budget is intended to fund. The use of the contingency is what provides a degree of protection from the impact of the credit crunch. There has been the loss of some private sector equity in relation to the Olympic Village and, also, loss of private sector equity in relation to the construction of the press and broadcast centre, but for now, because the imperative is to maintain the construction programme, we are able to increase the allocation from contingency and to meet it within the headroom available because certain of the risks that were funded within the contingency have not materialised. So there is sufficient headroom for us to cover that loss. The point you make, though, is what is the Olympics doing for the credit crunch, and for the businesses that you refer to in Wales that are suffering and people who are worried about the impact on them. The argument is that the £6.1 billion worth of investment that is going into the Olympic Park, plus the available further £2 billion of contingency, is investment at a time of great economic need, and that is why we are making this effort to make sure that the investment is available right round the country. Indeed, also, to businesses in Wales which are feeling the strain, who should derive benefit.

Q72 Mark Pritchard: As a Welsh/English borders, Shropshire MP, the Lilleshall National Sports Academy - you know it well - I have asked you many times, I think, on the floor of the House through regular questions whether Lilleshall will form part of this UK-wide Olympics. Could you possibly give me a commitment that Lilleshall will play an integral part of the training facility proposed for the national team, and, in fact, have some benefit for Wales as well because a lot of people commute into Shropshire from Wales?

Tessa Jowell: Can I write to you about that since the decisions about Lilleshall and the way in which its facilities are used are not decisions for me; they are decisions for the Secretary of State for Culture and the Sports Minister. I am very happy to make sure that that information is provided to you.

Chairman: Unless you wish for the Wrekin to become part of Wales, I am moving on.

Alun Michael: It is obvious that the Secretary of State has not been briefed that Shropshire has moved into Wales. It is probably a good idea.

Q73 Hywel Williams: Can I just ask you about the figure of £100 million or £63 million, I think you said ----

Tessa Jowell: It was £65 million.

Q74 Hywel Williams: ---- which has been lost to Wales. Does your estimate include the match funding that would be affected by having the money that is now being lost? Both you and I come from the third sector (?), and for every pound you get in you are able to attract a pound from somewhere else - perhaps even more. Have you taken that into account in your costings?

Tessa Jowell: No, all the calculations in relation to the Lottery are specifically related to Lottery funding; they do not take account of the leverage value of that money.

Q75 Hywel Williams: Can I ask you to speculate as to how much extra funding might be lost by the loss of that £65 million? Would it possibly be another £65 million?

Tessa Jowell: The impact will vary. I think three or four years ago the formula was about £1.50 for every pound of Lottery, sometimes £2, sometimes more than that, but it is impossible, in the present economic climate, to assume that that leverage impact remains the same. Specifically for the purposes of your inquiry the figures that I quote refer only to money raised from the Lottery.

Q76 Hywel Williams: As a conservative estimate, between £1.50 and £2. It might be substantially more is lost to good causes in Wales than the £65 million.

Tessa Jowell: It may be a loss between 2009 and 2012 but the fact is that the benefits - this is why it is so important that we do everything we can to support all the agencies in Wales to maximise the benefits for the Olympics. Just look how brilliantly Welsh athletes did in the Beijing Games. Just look at the number of world-class facilities that Wales has; look at the potential tourism benefits; look at the fact that there are already 1,000 businesses that are registered for Olympic business. What we have to do is work together to make sure that the potential that Wales has to offer the Olympics is fully realised.

Q77 Hywel Williams: I am just concerned that those benefits should be accounted for properly. Thank you.

Tessa Jowell: If I can be absolutely clear about this, none of the figures relating to the Olympic Lottery budget are expressed in the terms that you suggest; they are all expressed only in terms of a Lottery pound.

Chairman: Can I ask the Committee that when I say one supplementary question I mean one supplementary question, and I will cut them off next time. I am just telling my Committee: one supplementary.

Q78 Alun Michael: Can we look at the relationships? You have just said it was very important to have good relationships to maximise the value of the Olympics within Wales. One of the consequences of what you described earlier is that the Olympics constitute a UK good cause, so there are legacy and regeneration benefits, partly focused on London but partly UK-wide. That means that the consequences do not flow through the Barnett formula and through the Assembly; therefore, it depends on your relationship and that of your officials with the Assembly, the extent to which they are able to make sure that those benefits are maximised. Can you tell us a little bit about the relationship between you and your officials and the Welsh Assembly in trying to make sure that that happens?

Tessa Jowell: I am very happy, as part of the work of the Nations and Regions Group, which is led by Charles Allen, to ensure a high level of formality in discussion with the Assembly than is the case at the moment. Certainly, when, for instance, we were finalising the Lottery agreement, of course we had discussions with the then Welsh Minister and Ministers from Scotland and Northern Ireland. There is not a formal relationship between the Olympic Executive and the Welsh Assembly. If one of the recommendations that comes from this Committee's inquiry is that you would value that, then, of course, we would be happy to pursue that.

Q79 Alun Michael: So, essentially, you would be open to ramping up the direct contact that you and your officials have with the Assembly Ministers and officials in that way?

Tessa Jowell: Yes, absolutely. It is worth just making clear to you that there is a Welsh Assembly representative on the Nations and Regions Group.

Q80 Alun Michael: We all know that that can be not necessarily a substitute for a direct relationship between ----

Tessa Jowell: The role of the Nations and Regions Group is going to accelerate in its importance because of our commitment that these are the UK Games in London. If your view is that that relationship should be further strengthened, I am entirely open to ways in which that might be achieved. Just to get on the record the other ways in which there is a high level of engagement, the ODA visits and ODA engagement with the Welsh Assembly -

Q81 Alun Michael: That will be the Overseas Defence Academy, would it? I hate acronyms.

Tessa Jowell: The Olympic Delivery Authority. And also visits by the Organising Committee.

Q82 Alun Michael: The specific point I was getting at, though, because I appreciate the number of formal arrangements, was that there could be a ramping up of the relationship between yourself and your officials with the Assembly Government in view of the fact that this does not go through the Barnett formula; therefore, that relationship could be particularly valuable.

Tessa Jowell: Yes, absolutely.

Q83 Alun Michael: Could I ask also about direct links to local authorities in Wales and to voluntary organisations in Wales, particularly in the community and sporting fields? Do you have a good link with the representative bodies in Wales of those organisations?

Tessa Jowell: Yes, I think there is. For instance, one small arts organisation in Wales has already been recognised through what we call the Inspire Mark, which is the Olympic logo without the rings, which imply commercial association and sponsorship. This, again, in the three years we have ahead, we expect to be a much more prominent way of making those links explicit.

Q84 Alun Michael: The reason I am asking the question, if I can explain, is not to question the elements that you have set up but just that, generally, things would normally be just left to the Welsh Assembly, because the finance would go through the Barnett formula in the Welsh Assembly (and the question of the trickle down, if you like, from this), and there is, perhaps, a need during the pre-Olympic period for a more direct relationship both with the Welsh Assembly Government and with the representative bodies of local government and voluntary organisations in Wales.

Tessa Jowell: We believe that that exists through the executive membership of the Nations and Regions Group, which then is responsible for leading the development of these relationships across Wales. If your considered view is that there should be a further level of engagement, then I would be delighted to respond to that.

Alun Michael: That is very helpful, thank you.

Q85 Mr Jones: Minister, you have been at pains to point out these are to be the UK Games, but I think that you would recognise, would you not, that there is a degree of disappointment within Wales that more events are not being held there. I think, in fact, the only events that are being held directly in Wales are some heats of the football tournament. Why was it not possible to have more events in Wales?

Tessa Jowell: I do recognise your disappointment, particularly about the mountain biking being held in Essex, and I have to tell you that your Secretary of State, Paul Murphy, was a very staunch advocate of mountain biking and other Olympic benefits for Wales.

Q86 Mr Jones: Particularly since Essex is not notably mountainous.

Tessa Jowell: Let me just say that the decisions about venues are decisions are taken in close discussion with the International Olympic Committee, led by the Organising Committee. In this respect, we are, essentially, a key partner with the International Olympic Committee. They made absolutely clear that one of the most important characteristics of a London Games would be that they would be geographically compact. So decisions in relation to shooting, for instance, were taken in light of that, and, also, the decision in relation to mountain biking, which was approved by the IOC. So, I understand the disappointment in Wales that mountain biking could not be located there; it is located in Essex. There are mountain bike venues that are part of the approved preparation camps, so I hope that within Wales efforts will be made to ensure that mountain bike teams come and prepare in those facilities.

Q87 Mr Jones: Yes, but, with respect, Minister, it is not the same thing; preparation is very different from competition, particularly since, I think, in Neath Port Talbot there is a very well-developed mountain biking facility. I am sure that my colleague, Mr Williams, for example, will be disappointed that none of the sailing events are being held in Pwllheli, where, again, there is a high quality facility. It does seem that, whilst you say it is intended to be a compact Games, it is really very London-centric.

Tessa Jowell: You are absolutely right; it is, principally, a London Games. We might all wish that the venues could be spread all round the UK so they would be the UK's Games, but we would not have won the bid. I do not want to raise any hopes that anything will now be different. It is absolutely legitimate to register your disappointment but what I cannot do is to hold out any possibility that anything will change, because it will not. The important thing now is that the final decisions on the venues have been taken and that progress on their construction proceeds on time, which means that we have our best chance of making sure it proceeds within budget.

Q88 Mr Jones: You said you were anxious to have a compact Games. As you know, the Beijing Games had many events many hundreds of miles away from Beijing.

Tessa Jowell: Well, it had two: sailing and equestrian - equestrian in Hong Kong and Sailing in Qingdao. Our sailing will be at Weymouth and our equestrian will be in Greenwich Park.

Q89 Mr Jones: Given that in Beijing they were prepared to go further afield, I cannot understand. You mentioned the point about wanting a compact Games but the United Kingdom is a very compact country; it is not difficult to get around. Given that you have an aspiration to make this the UK Games, I think I do have to press you on this. There is huge disappointment in Wales that Wales is, really, receiving nothing at all, except for certain stages of the football tournament. In fact, I would dare say that that is probably because the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff is a world-class facility, and you can hardly ignore that.

Tessa Jowell: It is a world-class facility and it will host a number of the football matches, as the Hamden Stadium in Glasgow will also host part of the football competition. There are many reasons that guide the International Olympic Committee in this. One is the wish of athletes to be part of the whole Olympic festival, and the extent to which they will live in the Olympic Village, they will be close to the venues and they will be part of the overall Olympic experience - some 10,500 of them. That is the first point. The second is looking at the affordability: building a single athletes' village rather than athletes' villages associated with venues all round the UK. To a very great extent we have been given a template by the IOC; it formed part of our bid, and the compact Games was a very important part of why we won. You should not overstate the degree of dispersal in China; it was very specific and two sports. It is our wish, as government, to maximise the UK-wide benefits and UK-wide participation that leads to the efforts that I have set out earlier.

Q90 Mr Jones: Do you happen to know the cost of constructing the mountain biking facility in Essex?

Tessa Jowell: It is still, from memory, a matter for negotiation and the final contract being agreed. I know what our indicative figure is but it would not be appropriate to publish that at this stage. I am very happy, Chairman, either to provide it in confidence or to let you have it once the negotiations are complete.

Mr Jones: Thank you.

Q91 Mark Williams: You mentioned the Australian Paralympic team's decision to base its training camp in Wales. How proactive have you been as a Minister in promoting that list of the 31 Olympic and Paralympic training venues across Wales? I very much welcome that and I appreciate what you say about dispersal and how important that is, but I just have to reiterate what Mr Jones said: it is really important that we get that right because the figures we have heard this morning about four companies and contracts of up to £100,000 and the fact that there are only two events outside London, does resonate very precisely ----

Tessa Jowell: It is more than two events outside London, but within the context of the IOC requirements that the Games are compact.

Q92 Mark Williams: I know you understand the scepticism in Wales, but you talk about a UK Olympics and then you talk about a compact London Olympics. People are very concerned about that.

Tessa Jowell: Beyond the staging, what I have been setting out are the benefits that can derive to Wales from the Games. I think the other point I would make is that yes, I have promoted the attractiveness of training camp venues right across the UK. I spent a very large part of my time in China promoting the UK as a destination, particularly to Chinese businesses and to the many national Olympic committees that were gathered there. What I would also say is that this should not all be done centrally. I will spend every waking minute promoting the benefits of the UK, but there is a very exciting role for Wales itself, either through the Assembly, through Members of Parliament or through local authorities, to do this promotion of the Welsh benefits and the attractiveness of Wales to visiting teams. So I think this has to be a shared responsibility rather than something that is simply done from either the Olympic Executive in London or from the Organising Committee in London, and that is why we are building this very strong nations and regions capacity.

Q93 Mark Williams: Mr Michael talked about formalising the relationship between the National Assembly and the Olympic organisation. Are you satisfied that the National Assembly and local authorities are rising to the challenge in terms of promoting those venues for training camps, for instance?

Tessa Jowell: I am not party to all the discussions that may currently be under way between Welsh local authorities or the Assembly and countries. If you are doing this it necessarily will tend to be within a fairly private context at the outset. So if you ask me whether I know about every single negotiation that every single Welsh local authority is undertaking, no, but I would not expect to. However, what I would expect to do, at the point where a deal is being sealed, if we can add value and certainty to that, is to make sure we do, and then to keep on, as we review the level of take-up across the country of the 630-plus venues, to look at the degree of spread, to look at whether there are parts of the country where nothing is happening and look at whether, therefore, we need to engage with those local authorities, the national governing bodies and say: "You are not promoting X part of the UK".

Q94 Hywel Williams: Are you confident that the cultural events leading up to 2012 and also the Games themselves will reflect the full cultural diversity of the UK?

Tessa Jowell: I certainly hope they will, yes. All the efforts will be made to make sure that they will. I think the Eisteddfod will be taking place at about the same time as the Olympics, or very close to it, and that is a fantastic opportunity, not just in 2012 but, obviously, in the run up to the Games. I can give you the figures for the number of handover events that took place. There were five events that took place in Wales in August to celebrate the handover and the beginning of the Cultural Olympiad, with five events specifically in relation to the celebration of the Cultural Olympiad, which included lighting up the Millennium Centre in London 2012 colours and Sing the Nation in Swansea and Cardiff, part of a festival which was to unite the whole of the UK in song. That will be one of the continuing programmes of the Cultural Olympiad. Yes, the cultural tradition of Wales has got a huge contribution to make to the Cultural Olympiad, and the signs are that Wales is ready and, indeed, playing its part in that.

Q95 Hywel Williams: Can I ask you specifically what is the status of the Welsh language on the 2012 website and, also, in the Olympic publications?

Tessa Jowell: I am advised that on the LOCOG website there is information in the Welsh language.

Q96 Hywel Williams: I was just wondering about its status. Perhaps I could just illustrate this. Before this Committee meeting I did Google the "London 2012 Olympics", and that Google generated 3,190,000 entries. I then Googled: "Olympad 2012 Cymru (?)" (it was a very narrow request) which means "Olympics 2012, Wales", and that generated three: two from the BBC and one from a private individual.

Tessa Jowell: But not from the website of the Organising Committee?

Q97 Hywel Williams: As I said, it was a very narrow request. It seems to me, therefore, that that suggests there is not a buzz amongst the mixed society about the Olympics in Welsh. Three million-odd in English and three in Welsh. Does that not suggest to you that the message is not getting through in Welsh?

Tessa Jowell: The first point is that I think we need to look at that, and I am very happy, again, if the Committee wishes to recommend in specific ways how we can improve the situation, to consider those very carefully indeed. I am advised that the Organising Committee have developed a Welsh area of the website; that LOCOG is working closely with the Welsh Language Board and that the Organising Committee also ensure that all public-facing campaign activity in Wales is in Welsh: the 2012 roadshow, for instance, certificates for Welsh venues and the training camp guide. So there is a very full commitment to ensure that the Welsh language is properly represented, and I am, again, happy to send you some supplementary information about that so that when you come to consider your recommendations you can make a judgment about whether it is adequate. From what you say, I am sure we can.

Q98 Hywel Williams: I just think it is important to generate some excitement.

Tessa Jowell: I absolutely agree with you.

Q99 Hywel Williams: Can I ask you about the cultural diversity of the four nations of the UK? Does the approach extend to the corporate sponsors of the Games as well?

Tessa Jowell: The programme?

Q100 Hywel Williams: As far as reflecting the diversity. Does that extend to the corporate sponsors as well?

Tessa Jowell: If I understand your question, in the activity that corporate sponsors invest in, is the diversity of the UK represented?

Q101 Hywel Williams: Exactly.

Tessa Jowell: The answer to that is yes, and that would be through the activities that are generated by what is called the activation budget of the sponsors - the Tier one, Tier two and Tier three sponsors - delineated on the basis of how much money they contribute. Yes, we would certainly expect diversity to be recognised.

Q102 Hywel Williams: Can I ask you one other question? You mentioned earlier on the Eisteddfod in Wales. There is also the Urdd Eisteddfod, which is the Olympic Eisteddfod. Can I ask you, specifically: there has been a request that the Olympic Torch Relay should visit the Urdd National Eisteddfod. When will a decision be made on the route for the torch relay?

Tessa Jowell: Probably not for at least a couple of years, but I am quite sure that you will come back many times to press the case for that, and I can well understand the iconic importance of that in Wales.

Q103 Mark Williams: To carry on the theme of young people and schools, the memorandum from the Sports Council for Wales states: "Never before will children in the United Kingdom have experienced an equivalent 'advertising campaign' for sport." That is great and I think we would all concur with that. How do you see the enduring legacy of sport in our schools?

Tessa Jowell: The big ambition was stated, when we won the bid in Singapore, as transforming the lives of a generation of young people through sport. I see that process as having begun back in 2002 when we were just considering a bid and we were very concerned about the low level of sporting participation by children in schools at that point. From memory, I think, 23% of children in schools were playing two hours of sport or more. That figure is now more than 90%. So over what will be a decade children will be taken from two hours a week - a minority playing for two hours a week of sport - to a position where all children will have the opportunity to play at least five hours of sport including competitive sport. The significant challenge is how do we prevent the drop off at 16? There is a cliff face in young people's participation once they get to 16 and leave full-time education. So within the commitment is provision for at least three hours for young people in further and higher education between the ages of 16 and 19 and, beyond that, a very clear target that two million more people will play sport and be physically active by the time we get to 2012. The latter are targets for England being delivered through Sport England, but it would be our expectation that the Sports Council in Wales would have a similar ambition.

Q104 Mark Williams: The National Assembly Government has a very clear strategy on those matters. Are you doing anything specifically to encourage volunteering? There have been representations made to this Committee about the lack of coaching available and concerns over CRB checks. Just to carry that a stage further, you have talked about institutions of education, but beyond that?

Tessa Jowell: The volunteering is one of the great opportunities for the Olympics, and the Organising Committee itself will need about 70,000 volunteers to work within the Olympic Park and other Olympic venues, like the Millennium Stadium, during the period of the Games. However, we want to go much further than that because quite a substantial proportion of those volunteers will be people who have specialist skills - paramedics, security and so forth. Already, I think, the latest figure is 150,000 people have registered on the Organising Committee's website to be volunteers in 2012. So over the next three years we are going to see, I think, an explosion in interest in people right across the UK in volunteering as part of the Olympics.

Q105 Mark Williams: Can you supply a breakdown of where those volunteers are coming from?

Tessa Jowell: Yes, we can certainly do that. The last breakdown I saw, which was about nine months ago, showed predominantly from London and the South East, but we will certainly be very happy to give you the figures for Wales. I think that is another area where, I think, working through the Assembly with voluntary organisations in Wales, we can begin to galvanise interest. We are already working on plans for a nationwide volunteering programme. We are also looking specifically at the Personal Best programme, which is just becoming a national programme, which is engaging people who are, perhaps, the most disadvantaged and taking them through a period of voluntary sector activity (and Alun Michael will be very familiar with this) with a view to their acquiring the level of skills that means that they could get jobs, and so forth. So far, the programme started in London and I think there are three pilot regions and we are looking to extending that to Wales. I hope the Committee will support that.

Q106 Alun Michael: There has obviously been a considerable increase in the profile of the Paralympic Games, and general public interest in a way that there was not a few years ago. Are you confident that the profile that is given to the Paralympics and the marketing of the Paralympics will be on a par with that of the Olympics?

Tessa Jowell: Yes, absolutely. One of the great achievements of the Beijing Games was to create a sense of equivalence between the Olympics and the Paralympics. When we have been looking at the lessons learned from Beijing, one of the very strong views is that part of the most powerful lasting legacy will be the changed attitudes to disability in China, and increased physical access within Beijing. We have just the same scale of ambition in relation to the Paralympics. You will know, obviously, about the amazing achievement of Welsh Paralympians and the power of leadership and influence that that creates for young disabled people in Wales.

Q107 Alun Michael: Indeed, because even though the number of medals went down, the number of individuals winning medals went up this time.

Tessa Jowell: Dave Roberts has now won as many gold medals as Tanni Grey-Thompson.

Q108 Alun Michael: That is right. How can we lift that particular aspect, where Wales has probably out-performed, generally across the UK? Are there lessons to be learnt from the activities of disabled Paralympians within Wales for the rest of the UK?

Tessa Jowell: The first way that we achieve and build on that change is in your first point, which is that we ensure equivalence. There is not anything we do, as an Olympic leadership group, which does not include both potential Olympians and Paralympians; training funds are available to Paralympians as well as to Olympians. The young people's programmes are also as available to young disabled athletes as they are to able-bodied athletes. Obviously, accessibility has been designed in to all the venues in the Olympic Park. Again, I hope that this is a song that can become a chorus of voices right round the country, so that every time we talk about Olympics we also talk about Paralympics, and every time we talk about Olympic success we talk about Paralympic success, and the story of Welsh success is so remarkable here that you have got lots to trumpet.

Q109 Mr Jones: Could I turn to tourism, please, and the potential benefit to Wales and the rest of the United Kingdom in terms of tourism that we hope to derive from the Olympics. How is it proposed that the 2012 Games will be marketed so as to encourage overseas visitors to Wales?

Tessa Jowell: There is an estimated UK-wide tourism benefit in the region of about £2 billion. Between now and 2012, obviously, you have the Ryder Cup. Yesterday, when I was thinking about this session with you today, looking at the previous impact of the Ryder Cup, the impact of the Ryder Cup when it was hosted in Ireland was in excess of some £88 million. You will obviously want to capitalise not just on the 2012 benefits but, before that, the tourism benefits that flow from hosting the Ryder Cup at Celtic Manor. I say that because I think Australia is generally regarded as the country that did best from its tourism legacy, and it is important to understand that the tourism benefits derive not just from visitors to the Games but from visitors that decide to come back after the Games for a second or subsequent visit. In Wales there is the real opportunity to take the hosting of the Ryder Cup in 2010 as a platform from which to encourage people to come back in 2011 and 2012, and I hope very much that the tourism authorities in Wales will do that.

Q110 Mr Jones: How is the Ryder Cup being marketed? Of course, the Welsh Assembly Government has competence in respect of tourism coming from Europe; from the rest of the world I think it is within the ambit of VisitBritain. Do you know how the Ryder Cup is being marketed by VisitBritain, at the moment?

Tessa Jowell: I do not know how the Ryder Cup is being marketed. Again, that would be a question I suggest you direct to the Secretary of State with Ministerial responsibility for VisitBritain, and that is the Secretary of State for Culture, and the Sports Minister. I am sure they would be very happy to provide you with information on that. I can say that, more generally, the fact of hosting the Olympics in London in 2012 is bringing other global sporting events to the UK before and after. For instance, the Weymouth sailing venue will host the World Sailing Championships in 2010, and again, Chairman, I would be very happy to provide you with a list of the World Championships in a whole variety of Olympic and other sports that are due to be held in the UK in the run up to 2012 and immediately after.

Q111 Mr Jones: How far involved is the tourism marketing strategy, at the moment?

Tessa Jowell: There is an Olympic marketing strategy that VisitBritain are in the process of implementing. It focuses on a number of things, including quality of accommodation and the reasonable price of accommodation. Obviously, in the Olympic Transport Plan and the development of the integrated operation plan, one of the things that we are looking at is ease of access to London, both by affordability and ease of access, from all parts of the UK, including Wales.

Q112 Mr Jones: Which overseas markets, in particular, will be targeted?

Tessa Jowell: I think, again, if I can just say, Chairman, these are questions that you need to direct to the relevant tourism Minister because I am not the Minister who has responsibility for VisitBritain. We are, through the promotion within the Nations and Regions Group, working to ensure that the tourism benefits are realised through the English regions and through the Regional Development Agencies.

Q113 Hywel Williams: Can I ask you about disability access and tourism in relation to the Paralympic Games? Clearly, awareness of accessibility issues could be improved now, running up to the Paralympics. What are you actually doing to ensure that accessibility is a priority for the tourism sector in Wales, and throughout the UK, in the run up to the Paralympic Games?

Tessa Jowell: Again, this is an opportunity that the Olympics create for venues to upgrade their accessibility. The responsibility for identifying the venues and driving that through would, obviously, sit with the Welsh Assembly and, where relevant, UK Ministers. Certainly, accessibility will have been taken into account in the training camp facilities, particularly those that have been designated for Paralympic use. This is a very good example of where the Olympic Executive cannot take sole responsibility for seeing through all this change and the realisation of all these opportunities. The Olympics creates a unique opportunity; it is therefore for the various agencies and bodies to realise that. I understand, also, just in relation to training camps, that the Welsh Assembly is using the Pre-Games training camps agenda to offer best practice advice on accommodation providers and, also, to raise the profile of accessible transport. So that has had an impact. They are using the Olympics as a basis for, if you like, campaigning and cajoling, and you may wish to take that further with them.

Q114 Alun Michael: Returning to the question of business engagement, I think you did give the figure earlier about the numbers registering on the CompeteFor website.

Tessa Jowell: One thousand businesses.

Q115 Alun Michael: Do you have a target for the extent to which contracts should be awarded to businesses outside London?

Tessa Jowell: No. There is a carrot and stick impact here. The carrot is that we can open the door to the possibility, we can provide the brokerage network and we have had business summits around the country bringing businesses together - Chambers of Commerce, Regional Development Agencies, Economic Development bodies and so forth - telling them about what is possible, getting the businesses registered and then the information goes out to them. So beyond that what the ODA are after is the best contract that represents best value for money. What we cannot do is to skew the procurement rules either to create a particular benefit to one part of the country, one group of workers or anything else, and you obviously understand that.

Q116 Alun Michael: I understand that but, on the other hand, there is a tendency to feel it will not happen unless ----

Tessa Jowell: Which is why we have been so purposeful. You really should not underestimate how proactive we have been. Let me just, if I may, Chairman, identify two areas of this proactivity. One is in spreading the business benefits, and 98% of the businesses that have won contracts are UK firms and 46%, I think, are outside London. Why is this so important? It is important because before we won the Games I commissioned a report to provide us with a baseline of what the economic benefits of hosting the Olympics would be. It showed very clearly that the disproportionate benefit would fall to London, with substantial displacement from other parts of the UK. We want to counter that inevitability. That is what happens if you do nothing. So we are countering that inevitability through the means that I have set out. I do not know of another Olympics that has been more proactive in spreading the economic benefits, particularly important at a time of downturn like this, and spreading those benefits to businesses that are under pressure all over the country.

Q117 Alun Michael: I am entirely happy that it is the outcome that counts rather than setting targets that do not mean anything, and the figures that you have just given us are quite significant. However, the Committee found, in asking the Welsh Assembly Government what sort of benefit was coming to Welsh businesses, that it was difficult to provide that information because companies are not allowed to publicise their involvement. That may be entirely reasonable. The point is, therefore, we need to get at the information in a different way. The figures that you have just given are helpful. Will it be possible to provide equivalent figures for the non-London; to Wales - and I am sure similar questions would arise in relation to the regions?

Tessa Jowell: I think that we have to handle this carefully. I can give you an illustration of the companies that have won contracts. The important figures for the Welsh Assembly are that there are 1,000 Welsh businesses registered, and four have won contracts.

Q118 Alun Michael: As we go down the line, there are those who want to say it is all gloom and doom and the impact of the Olympics is not good for Wales. I think it is very important that we should be able to ----

Tessa Jowell: Focus on the 1,000.

Q119 Alun Michael: Those that are registered?

Tessa Jowell: Those are registered, yes.

Q120 Alun Michael: I was asking about those that have actually become part of the supply chain.

Tessa Jowell: Let me tell you about the contracts that have been awarded to businesses in Wales through the ODA supply chain, because I think this is the information you are after: Fairfield Maybe (structural steelwork - steelwork for structures, bridges and highways) for Balfour Beatty; Rowecord Holdings (structural steelwork - steelwork for the Aquatic Centre), again, for Balfour Beatty, who are building the Aquatic Centre; Rhino Doors (for shafts that provide access to underground power lines) for Murphys, who underground the ----

Q121 Alun Michael: If I may say so, I think, in going through this list you are demonstrating that there is information available which would be helpful in answering this question. Perhaps a follow-up note would be helpful. You are absolutely on the territory that I was asking about. I am grateful for that.

Tessa Jowell: I would be very happy, in the light of this session today, to provide you, in confidence where necessary, with a continued update ----

Q122 Alun Michael: That would be helpful.

Tessa Jowell: ---- on the information about Welsh businesses. I would just love to see that figure substantially increase. We can effect some impact on that, but a lot of it needs to come, as I say, as well from the concerted activity through business support services and the other agencies within Wales.

Q123 Hywel Williams: Something has occurred to me, slightly out of sequence, Minister. You did refer earlier on in your evidence to the £675 million which will be realised when the assets are disposed of.

Tessa Jowell: Up to.

Q124 Hywel Williams: What will actually happen to that money? Will it be returned to the Lottery or will it be distributed in some other way?

Tessa Jowell: There are two claimants, if you like, on the proceeds of Olympic land sales: one is the LDA, who will be reimbursed for the purchase cost and the remediation costs, and the second is the Lottery. This is an agreement, which still stands, which I reached with the previous Mayor of London. The money will be repaid over time. Obviously, we will have to take account of the state of the market 2012 and beyond to ensure that the land is sold at a time that strikes a proper balance between the development of sustainable communities within the Olympic Park and the best price for the land. We have a formula and I am very happy to give the Committee a copy of the memorandum of understanding which sets out the order in which the £675 million from the Lottery will be returned.

Q125 Hywel Williams: Can you give us a headline figure for the amount that is going to be returned to the Lottery itself for distribution to good causes?

Tessa Jowell: It is our hope that most or all of the £675 million will be returned. I only qualify that slightly because we will want to view that in the light of the recovery of land values at the time we get to 2012.

Q126 Hywel Williams: Then it will be up to the Lottery to decide how that £675 million (or less) will be distributed?

Tessa Jowell: Yes, but the call from each of the Lottery distributors is an average of 10-11% and, from memory, between 2009 and 2012. So I would expect that money to be returned to the Lottery distributors in the same proportion in which it was diverted.

Hywel Williams: Thank you.

Q127 Chairman: Could I end this session with one final question, and it is about SMEs? Are you satisfied or content with the level of support given to SMEs to ensure that they can compete for contracts being generated by the Olympics?

Tessa Jowell: It is a very important question because we know that many SMEs are suffering very badly at the moment, through loss of borrowing facilities and so forth. About 70% of the businesses that are registered on the CompeteFor network are small and medium-sized enterprises, and that is why all the remarks I was making earlier about the potential benefits from this investment to stabilisation of parts of the economy across the country is so relevant to Wales. I am not able to give you a breakdown of how many of the 1,000 businesses registered are small and medium-sized enterprises, but I think that you can draw from the overall average of 70% that it will be about 700.

Q128 Chairman: Minister, thank you very much for your evidence this morning. It has been extremely helpful for our inquiry. We look forward to receiving the additional information you have promised us. Could I, finally, place on the record my thanks to my colleagues who have been standing up for my constituency in regard to the mountain bike centre in Cardiff in the Afan Valley, which is quite outstanding. Without wishing to make a mountain out of a molehill we look forward to the success of that event in Essex, and the success of the Olympics and Paralympics in 2012.

Tessa Jowell: I think that is a very generous conclusion, Chairman. I greatly value having this session with you, and I hope that the number of areas in which we think are open to further collaboration are ones that we can explore, and I look forward to appearing before you again.

Chairman: Thank you very much.