Boris Johnson has backed London Assembly calls for the public to have more information about Olympic ticket pricing and sales.
Assembly Members want the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) to provide details of how many tickets were sold at each of the price point and how many cheaper tickets were allocated for each event.
Last week an Assembly report warned that “secrecy” on the part of LOCOG “risks jeopardising public confidence” in the games.
Speaking at Mayor’s Question Time on Wednesday, the Mayor said he shared the concerns of AMs and echoed their calls for “transparency”.
The Mayor also branded the ticket process a “cruel engine of disappointment” for Londoners who had been unable to secure tickets and promised to raise the issue at the next meeting of the Olympic Board which oversees the games.
Speaking after the meeting, Liberal Democrat London Assembly Olympic spokesperson Dee Doocey welcomed the Mayor’s comments.
Doocey said: “I am delighted that the Mayor supports the London Assembly’s call for transparency from LOCOG. In particular I welcome the fact that he has agreed to try to persuade LOCOG at the next Olympic Board meeting to immediately release the information.
“We need to know now how many tickets have been sold for each event, and at what price. If this information is not provided until all the tickets are sold it will be too late to do anything about it.”
“LOCOG excuses for not publishing information are indefensible from an organisation that only exists because of a huge investment of public money.”
Armando says
The Mayor “cruel engine of disappointment” comment is spot on. But I would like to know not only how many tickets were sold per event and how much, but also how many tickets were sold to each applicant relative to quantity applied. How many people that applied for a single ticket got that single ticket and how many people that applied for say 50 tickets got at least a ticket. You see, far from being a “fair process”, as described in the past by LOCOG, it was a flawed and extremely unjust one. It was’t completely clear what one had to do with unwanted tickets i.e. will I be allowed to sell them or end up stuck with them? It simply means that the whole process was based on risk and on risk only. If I had £5,000-£10,000 to risk then I would surely have ended up with some tickets. In other words, the process rewarded relatively wealthy individuals and inconsiderate g amblers while disappointing the average Londoner.