A while ago the LDA was telling us to treat its own predictions that the London Olympics would result in 50,000 new jobs 'with caution'. Now Newham's Mayor Sirrobin has come up with the even more outrageous total of 100,000 new jobs.

Frank Morris speaks out: The demonstration outside the Olympic site on 1st March called in solidarity with the courageous whistleblower (centre) sacked for standing up for an illegally blacklisted workmate.

from Corporate Watch

Official prestige tickets for the 2012 Olympics, which include food and drink, are going to be some of the most expensive in the history of sport, at £4,500 per person.

These tickets cannot be sold as single tickets, but only in blocks of ten. In addition, conditions of purchase will mean that an individual or company buying hospitality tickets for the opening or closing ceremonies of the Games will have to pay a minimum of £270,000, because seats for other events much also be bought at the same time. The only sports tickets to ever be more expensive were those for the 2011 Super Bowl in Texas at £5,545 each. However, once tax is added, the Olympics tickets become £5,400, so together with the ‘minimum buy’ requirements the tickets are not far off the most expensive sports tickets in history.

Remember that compact between TELCO and the London Olympic Committee in November 2004 when the Olympic Committee promised to pay the living wage? The one that was abandoned by the ODA in September 2006? And which the ODA said it 'would ask' its contractors to keep in March 2007? Which one in five workers then said in October 2010 they were not being paid?

Just a few miles up the Lea Valley in Edmonton, Olympics TOP partners (ie top level sponsors) have a factory. This report of the current strike is reposted from Harringey Solidarity Network

Passionate about BS PR? If you can not only believe the hype but also demonstrate a track record of eagerness to help perpetuate it, this could be

photo: fakelvis on Flickr

Kevin Blowe on the demise of the Food Standards Agency and the announcement that

The Hackney Citizen reports:

Only one Hackney apprentice on Olympics site: MP Diane Abbott slams low numbers of opportunities for local people

After discovering that only one apprentice working on the Olympics site comes from Hackney, local MP Diane Abbott has called on the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) to address the low numbers of apprentices on the Olympic site as a matter of urgency.

During his recent foray into East London with the cabinet Gordon Brown once again played up the job benefits of the Olympics saying "Thanks to the Olympics, thousands of jobs are being created and protected in some of the industries worst hit by the recession - and in some of Britain's most deprived areas." Back in January he claimed the 2012 Olympics would create 50,000 new jobs, a considerable advance on the Compulsory Purchase Inquiry in 2006 when the LDA was saying there would be 6,000 net new jobs arising from the Olympics. With a budget of £9.34billion and rising, along with more spending to come after the Games, there should indeed be some new jobs, but specifically how many, in what employment sectors and how many would have been created if the Olympics hadn’t happened? I decided to ask some Freedom of Information questions to see if the LDA could be more specific.