23 Oct 2012
London 2012 '£400m under budget'
BY Tom Walker
The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games are set to come in under budget, figures from the government's final quarterly economic report show.
The overall cost of the Games is forecast at £8.921bn, a saving of £377m on the £9.298bn budget.
In addition, £103m of contingency is being held to cover the remaining risks in the programme, such as the retrofit of the Olympic Village for legacy use and closing out around 2,000 Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) and LOCOG contracts.
In total, £480m of uncommitted contingency still remains within the budget.
The anticipated final cost (AFC) of the ODA's construction and transport programme is £6.714bn - a decrease of £47m on the previous figure. Savings made by the ODA on its programme have now reached £1.032bn.
Additional finance was released to LOCOG from the funding package, including £26m for capital works with legacy benefits, £16m for Government's share of the cost of the Paralympic Games, and £14 million for Olympic Park venues and infrastructure. These costs are all contained within the overall forecast cost of the programme.
Dennis Hone, chief executive of the ODA, said: "We are delighted that the venues and infrastructure that we were responsible for delivering proved to be such a big hit and provided an incredible stage and backdrop for the world's greatest sporting event, for millions of spectators, and for Olympic and Paralympic athletes whose performances will never be forgotten.
"We are pleased to report even more savings made through careful stewardship of public money. We're now entering the final phase of the ODA's work, transforming the Olympic Village into thousands of new homes and building a community that will become established, grow and mature in the decades ahead - a London 2012 legacy for generations to come."
To read the full report on the cost of the Games, click here.
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