The troubled London Stadium came under the spotlight again yesterday as Labour’s London mayor Sadiq Khan ordered an investigation into the escalating costs.
A spokesperson for the mayor slammed the previous Conservative administration of Boris Johnson for leaving the stadium’s finances in a “total and utter mess”.
Johnson said the cost of transforming the then-Olympic Stadium into one suited to football – since then taken over by West Ham United, who have been bedevilled by crowd trouble at their new home – would cost £272mn, a figure which has now risen to £323mn.
Costs such as retractable seating – necessary for when the stadium hosts concerts and athletics meets – have sky-rocketed.
According to the BBC, the annual cost for that has gone from £300,000 to £8mn because the company that won the original contract has gone broke.
“The mayor is deeply concerned about the finances of the Olympic Stadium, which have clearly been left in a total and utter mess by the previous administration at City Hall,” a spokesperson for the mayor said.
“Sadiq has ordered a detailed investigation into the full range of financial issues surrounding the stadium.”
The onus on who pays for the extra costs will fall on stadium operators London Legacy Development Corp (LLDC) and the London taxpayer.
West Ham pay £2.5mn-a-year rent on top of their one-off £15mn contribution to the conversion cost – a deal that was castigated by the Taxpayers Alliance and Leyton Orient’s former chairman Barry Hearn, who tried unsuccessfully to share hosting rights with the Premier League club.
“The people negotiating on behalf of the government really need to take a look in the mirror,” said Hearn in April.
“This is an outrageous deal for the taxpayer – £728mn of stadium, £272mn to convert it specifically to a football venue, West Ham paying £2.5mn a year – doesn’t sound too bad...but then you realise that the stewarding, the turnstile operators, the police, the cleaners, the ground maintenance – all are being paid for by the stadium.”
The Hammers won the bid to occupy the Olympic Stadium in March 2013 – thus bringing to an end over a century’s worth of history at their previous Upton Park home.
Khan’s decision met with approval from not only the local council mayor Robin Wales – whose borough Newham co-owns the stadium after investing £40mn in it – but also the Olympic Stadium Coalition, which is made up of 14 football supporters’ trusts and groups from across the country.
Sadiq Khan: attacks Johnson
