Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bill [HL]

Lord Addington Excerpts

Tuesday 25th June 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, this is one of those Bills of which everybody is broadly in favour. We all think that it is a good idea. We all know of similar examples that have worked incredibly well. That does not mean that we are going to let the Bill go through without having a decent look at it.

Birmingham and the UK came into this in a very positive way to make sure that the Commonwealth Games happened when various arrangements were failing and it was not going to happen in Africa for the first time. That probably would have been better for the Commonwealth Games and for world sport. However, keeping the Games going means that there is the opportunity for the Games to be held in Africa next time, so there is something to be thankful for.

However, this means that we are doing things quickly. With the London Olympics we had a long run-in period. Indeed, the process of getting ready for the bid was seen to be part of the Games’ legacy. That was how I felt at the time. We were getting our heads in the right place to go and do it. We must try to remember that as we go forward.

As the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Rooker, and my noble friend Lady Burt said, there seems to be a reluctance to engage with us. It will become more important, as has been pointed out, with the Commons that the Government engage with us and make sure that we are fully involved so we know that when somebody is being mildly inconvenienced it is not the end of the world. I think the noble Lord, Lord Snape, talked about fury in a headline. He caught it just about right there. The fact of the matter is that everybody will be slightly inconvenienced by this at some point if they are living in the area.

It is not just this city; the whole nation will get a benefit from this. Birmingham effectively becomes the standard bearer for the nation for a wonderful thing: a multi-sport event over several days that is a festival of sport that brings in people to look at sports they do not normally see, to appreciate them, to build up from. We must remember that as we go through.

That means we must cohere behind the idea and make sure it has weight to push it through. It will not help this if the Games organisers do not engage with us. I have a minor gripe about the Olympics. I was one of the people who said, “Do not send me hundreds of press releases; if something goes wrong or is not quite right, make sure we have somebody to contact”. This took a little bit of doing and there was resistance to it—one of the very few lessons to be taken about things that did not happen. As it turned out, very little went wrong, but if you have a line of communication back and forth, you will be able to engage. It will not be the headline you are listening to. “There is a headline, can I pick up a phone and speak to somebody who will let us know what is going on?”—that is what is required.

I have a few specific questions on the hard legacy of this event. The Olympics established that we could build a very good, very big housing development with wonderful disabled access. We proved it. It has become something of a standard. Indeed, I remember the planning that went into it. When the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, I think, took the Bill through, he ended up saying on Report, “Wait a minute, this isn’t a Bill about disability access; it’s a Bill about the Olympics”. They put just about everything they could think of in there. Will we match that level of commitment, there and in future developments on that site? It means that you have to do much less work later on and it will be much more accessible. Let us face it, if you can get a wheelchair in it is usually easier to get a fridge or something out of the building as well. Flat entry surfaces are more convenient. If you put your work in up front you get something back.

On the stadiums and things we will actually use for sport, I hope we will get a definitive answer on the legacy and usage of the main stadium. I did the legacy report on the Olympics. I remember the great interaction between Leyton Orient and West Ham about who should have the stadium. It was quite good. With hindsight possibly the right decision was made, but still, what are we going to do? Birmingham is well placed in the country to have a major athletics centre, or one for other sports. I hope we will not find ourselves tied down to yet another Premiership football team moving in. We need smaller stadiums of good quality to take on major events that do not attract quite the same numbers. I hope we can get that out of this and that it is something we can get on with.

The new aquatics centre—or swimming pool—will be a good thing. We still do not have enough 50-metre pools. How are we going to work them in? How are they connected to each other with the infrastructure? We have had some information; we need more, and a steady stream of it, because we cannot guarantee to help people and to be as helpful as we can and should be. That is not a blank cheque, but it is the degree of support that should be offered unless we know what is going on. We have to make sure it is all there and that there are those commitments.

We do not have to do much else because there are these examples of where it has worked. We are actually taking on and building on a legacy of soft power and delivering big events here. There is no way we would be taking on this thing at such short notice without the success we experienced with the Olympics. Let us face it: we would be terrified without that structure, and we know that we can do it. We do not want to lose that ability, because if we can run a big multi-games event, we can run a festival or anything else. It is about as big a challenge as we are going to get. We have done it successfully—great, are we not clever? Let us make sure we remind the rest of the world how good we are. I hope we are starting a dialogue that means we will know what is going on and that we are enforcing the lessons we have learned and building on what has gone before.

No matter what happens, enhancing our national pride through successful international events will be a good thing. Regardless of whatever happens with Brexit, we might need an example of organising a good thing. We have provided the comedy; let us do something serious. If we can make sure we are doing that and enhancing it, it will go beyond merely making sure something happens properly; it will add to the whole sum of human enjoyment. Multi-event games are wonderful things. They are one of the best expressions of international joy and co-operation going. If we can take on another one and do it well we will have got a great thing out of this, but we need to make sure that we are open and communicative about we are doing and that people know exactly what is going on; otherwise, we will end up remembering things that probably only people like me remember—rows about whether your allotment is going to be there or not—as opposed to the fact that this is a wonderful thing that can give you memories for the rest of your life and give us the legacy of expertise in delivering something good. Let us make sure that that is what we take out of this.