A new publication by the the London Assembly has warned that unnecessary risks could jeopardise public confidence in the ticketing arrangements for the 2012 games.
The report ‘Sold Out?’ is the result of a two-year long campaign by the Assembly’s Economy, Culture and Sport (ECS) Committee.
The report highlights the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games’s refusal to provide a detailed breakdown of how many tickets have been sold at what price for each event.
LOCOG has previously indicated that around 28 per cent of the 8.8 million tickets would cost £20 or less, but refused to provide information to prove whether cheaper tickets were spread equally across all events, or concentrated in events like football, where supply exceeds demand.
LOCOG has been able to withhold information about ticket sales because its status as a private company makes it exempt from Freedom of Information requests. It has also claimed commercial confidentiality, but the Committee argues that this is unjustified when LOCOG is the sole provider of Games tickets and a previous Organising Committee has published the information.
Dee Doocey AM, Chair of the ECS Committee, said: “It is completely unacceptable that an organisation that only exists because of a huge investment of public money can hide behind its status as a private company to avoid questions it does not like.”
To see the report click here.
