2014 cash injection will give Scotland a sporting chance

Published on Saturday 30 August 2008 19:35

A HUGE athletes' village, situated on the banks of the Clyde and housing 8,000 people, is in the pipeline. A National Indoor Sports Arena, a new velodrome and a new Hockey Centre are also all in the offing.

The payments are also guaranteed: the Scottish Government has underwritten most of the cost and the local council has pledged to meet the rest.

Unlike in London, where costs for the 2012 Olympics appear to be escalating by the week, everything is on track. So why are organisers of the Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2014 bid this weekend pressing UK ministers for tens of millions of pounds in extra National Lottery funding for the city?

In the East End of Glasgow, where in six years' time the Commonwealth Games will be largely based, the razzmatazz and glamour presently feel a long way off. "It's like there is a moat around Parkhead," says one health worker in the shadow of Celtic Park." People don't come in and they don't leave either."

Just half an hour's walk from the city's bustling centre, Glasgow's East End has become synonymous with urban decay. Last week, new figures showed that children in parts of the East End have a lower life expectancy than those born in India. In Calton, a boy can only expect to live until 54 – that is 28 years less than a boy in the nearby affluent village of Lenzie.

Consequently, say organisers and politicians from all sides of politics, the fact that the Games' infrastructure is paid for should not rule out doing more to prevent Glasgow 2014 from becoming yet another faded memory in the long list of failed attempts to resuscitate the area. They say the 150m in lottery funding being demanded – which First Minister Alex Salmond insists is "Scotland's money" anyway – should be brought north, with Glasgow the biggest winner.

A shopping list is being prepared. Glasgow chiefs want to transform the city's sporting infrastructure so that it can once and for all ditch its sick man image. It also wants to use the Games – where 15,000 volunteers will be recruited and millions of pounds will be invested – to 'upskill' the local population.

Other ideas include a "Commonwealth rail line" linking the east of the city to the centre. The queues attempting to get in and out of Celtic Park every week attest to the fact that the East End's transport links are hopeless.

Others want the funds to be spent on a Skills Academy teaching teenagers a trade, in a bid to end Glasgow's benefits culture.

Some campaigners say the lottery funding should be secured as a contingency float if – as widely expected – the cost of the Games escalates. Currently, taxpayers in Glasgow, or across Scotland, would be forced to meet the bill. And the lottery money would also be used to help community groups in the East End.

SNP ministers also want sporting facilities across Scotland to benefit. Edinburgh Council last week confirmed that it is looking for ways to build a new cycling facility after the planned redevelopment of Meadowbank leaves the city without a velodrome. This lack of strategic planning has incensed many, not least Olympic quadruple gold medal-winning cyclist Chris Hoy.

Scottish Government sources say lottery funds would help this cause. Other projects that would benefit under SNP plans include the 23m Aberdeen 50-metre pool, which still requires more funds before being built.

However, such plans have reached an impasse. When he was First Minister, Jack McConnell enquired about lottery funding for Glasgow, only to be told that no money was available, with a total of 2.2bn already being used for the London Olympics.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport points out that the Commonwealth Games team did not seek lottery funding when they made their bid. Whitehall sources said last night that it was not realistic to ask for funding on the grounds that the city "deserved" it. "The bottom line is that there is no funding gap in the delivery of the Games," said one official.

But Glasgow's Commonwealth Games leaders – and Labour and SNP politicians – are now pressing the case, insistent that lottery funds could mark the difference between a one-off spectacular and an event that transforms an area whose poverty has, for too long, shamed the country.

The Games will happen as planned. The serious business before then is yet to be settled.