---

London Olympics Bill

Investigations by Robert Booth, a freelance journalist, showed that towards the end of 2003 a heads of term agreement was reached between the London Development Agency, acting on behalf of the bid team, and Stratford City Developments that neither would frustrate the planning applications of the other. At the time, Sir Stuart Lipton was a director of Stratford City Developments and also chairman of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, which was conducting a design review of the Olympic bid team’s proposals. There is no evidence that Sir Stuart took part in the design review, but does not it show the need for complete transparency in all the many public-private sector arrangements that will be needed to deliver the project? There should be proper parliamentary scrutiny of such arrangements.