Olympic legacy? Don't patronise us

Some of our readers may not be aware of this, but our Council, along with all the others in London, belongs to the Association of London Government which has it's own in-house magazine called the London Bulletin. Here at Greenwich Watch Towers we read it regularly and, in between wiping the blood from eyes, we occasionally see something amusing that deserves comment.

On the back page of this months issue, there is an interview with young Councillor Thorpe from Shooters Hill. He was asked whether he thought the 2012 Olympics would have a long-term benefits to London and he said,

"Definitely. As one of the host boroughs, we have already started work on the legacy we want to create and think that the Olympics will further increase our position as one of the key tourist destinations in London."

Now we agree with the first word largely, but we couldn't help but laugh at the claim that Greenwich had started work on the "legacy". After all, when they're not selling off sports ground they've been leaving them to decay resulting in their popularity with junkies.

However, the reason we found it so funny was that on the adjacent page to the interview was a section titled "Sporting Life" which showed the percentage of people by Borough who regularly participated in sport across London, it then placed the boroughs nationally in three groups. The top 25%, the middle 50% and the bottom 25%.

Do we really need to tell you that the borough working hard on the Olympics legacy is placed in the bottom 25% of the country for sport participation? In case you don't believe us, here is the pdf, just go to page 18.