Dubious WHU olympic Stadium deal must be released

The Information Commissioner has recently ruled that a freedom of information request over the dubious West Ham Olympic Stadium deal should be made public.

You'll remember the hullabaloo about the Newham council loan to be funded by the Treasury and an Olympic Park Legacy Company (OPLC) Director having a relationship with a West Ham employee which neither he, nor she, nor West Ham, nor the OPLC thought it responsible or ethical to declare, despite a clear conflict of interest.

The same OPLC director, Dionne Knight was doing 'paid consultancy' work for West Ham while the bidding process was going on and without telling her manager it was claimed. She was suspended and the rest just ignored, swept under the carpet. Few people believe a couple in a relationship do not talk about something they are both involved with, despite the claims at the time.

Once that deal had collapsed a new process was started that from the outside appeared to have one aim in mind and appeared to be amended along the way to fit in with a West Ham bid, at least that is the impression one got from reports at the time. It appeared as if there was a deliberate attempt to ensure West Ham would get the votes, which as it turned out they did, all of them.

It is a scandal that West Ham have been given a taxpayer-funded stadium that they control the use of. The London Legacy Development Cor[poration (LLDC) may well have broken European state-aid rules, as it failed to apply to the European Commission for an exemption. It is almost as if the LLDC would take any deal to get West Ham rather than Leyton Orient, who are the nearest club, in there.

It was the Charlton Athletic Supporters Trust who began the freedom of information request that the Information Commissioner has now ruled on, deciding that the details of the tenancy deal must be published. Naturally West Ham and the LLDC do not want transparency with taxpayers money, it isn't in their best interests and in my view could have very serious consequences for one individual at least.

To only pay £15-million for a stadium is preposterous, the taxpayer has clearly been stitched up, the rent doesn't cover the cost of running the stadium, West Ham are getting an income from naming rights and they have a veto on anyone else using the stadium for the whole of their lease period. West Ham and not the LLDC effectively control the use of the stadium, yet they are only a tenant.

How is that good for the taxpayer, especially given Karren Brady's remarks to the media where she made it plain she was talking about us when she said they would veto sharing? Clearly the taxpayer was not at the forefront of her thinking and it gave as clearer a demonstration as anyone could wish for that West Ham should not be controlling who uses the Olympic Stadium and who doesn't.

I don't find that surprising given her testimony to the House of Lords Select Committee which I'll look at in an upcoming article. I'm surprised a newspaper or the Taxpayers Alliance haven't picked up on it, but then again perhaps they didn't do the digging I did.

Now seems an appropriate time to raise questions over that testimony given West Ham's offer to give me verbal answers, which would, of course, have be deniable answers, but their refusal to give me written answers which would not have been deniable.