91Èȱ¬

So here's a reminder to all of you busy people who haven't had time to , the deadline to apply is midnight TONIGHT.

I'm reminding you because several friends of mine recently were almost caught out by the speed of which the application process has raced by. I'm pleased to say they have now got on the London 2012 website and filled in the application form.

I know they will make great volunteers because they are highly intelligent people with professional skills. But they are also heavily involved in sport and other activities and will know exactly how the competitors are feeling just hours before a race.

They will know how the athletes will be completely in the sporting "zone" and they will know how to help them through those decisive moments.

I've mentioned in my blog before that I believe the volunteers are crucial to the 2012 Olympics being a success. They are the people whom many visitors from around the world will remember when they leave the Games.

I'm not convinced that London 2012 have got their volunteer programme completely right.

I want to see more under-18s involved and, as I've said before, I think there should be more financial support for travel and accommodation to make sure people from around Britain get the chance to volunteer.

I will keep pressing 2012 and their sponsors to find ways of making this happen. In the meantime, I would encourage people from around London,the south east and from around the UK to volunteer.

Don't miss this fantastic opportunity to play a role in what has the potential to be the most exciting event in this country during our lifetime.

The 2012 Olympics will avoid drastic cuts in Wednesday's Comprehensive Spending Review, I have learned.

The which is building the facilities, will be told to make savings of around £30 million but there will be no major challenges to the £9.3 billion budget.

The savings are similar to the which the ODA was first told by the Government to make last May. Those did not lead to major changes in the project.

Much of the Olympic Park will be finished next summer so it would have been counterproductive to have started slashing funds now. Most of the £8 billion earmarked for the building has been spent.

Although there is around £600 million left in contingency funds, it is believed that the ODA should be given access to that cash in the next crucial 12 months.

The rest of the budget will be needed for security. Given that the Government has announced this week that keeping the Games safe is a key priority, there is also little scope for cuts.

However, today's Strategic Defence and Security Review has found some efficiency savings in the Olympic security budget saying it needs to make the programme as cost-effective as possible. It is expected that spending on security could be as much as £1 billion.

The biggest dispute involving the Treasury and Ministers from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport has been over the funding of elite athletes. I understand that the money for competitors is secure in the run-up to 2012 but it is likely that there will be cuts to the budgets of governing bodies, possibly of around 30%.

The Government agency receives around £50 million in Exchequer funding for Olympic athletes annually with the same again in Lottery grants.

The major cuts are expected to affect which funds grass roots sports through grants to governing bodies. It received £123 million in central funding this year with a similar amount in Lottery provision.

Today the Shadow Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell told me she is concerned school sports initiatives will be hit by the cuts

The details of the Olympic funding will not be announced by the Government on Wednesday. The cuts are likely to be made public on Thursday.

But he is still struggling to get the private cash to pay for it.

I understand Mr Johnson is looking for £2m from the private sector to pay for the 75,000 extra tickets he is buying in addition to the 50,000 he receives automatically from the organising committee for the kids' programme.

I've learned he went close to striking a deal last week with one leading London business but the negotiations broke down because the Mayor wanted too much money.

So, at the moment London council taxpayers will be paying for the tickets.

is hoping one in eight children will get a chance to get their hands on the free tickets. They qualify by achieving a goal at school as part of programme.

There is a serious hurdle to overcome for the Mayor in getting the private sector to pay for all this. Any backer is going to want publicity for the scheme. But that is unlikely to go down well with official sponsors.

The backer will look like an official sponsor when it won't be.

So, how about copying an idea from the 2008 Beijing Olympics? China funded its magnificent Aquatics Centre by asking thousands of Chinese businessmen abroad to pay towards the project.

How about asking hundreds of businesses and organisations across London to pay for the scheme?

They would receive small recognition for their support but it wouldn't be so dramatic that it would look like they were ambushing the Olympic marketing campaign?

Or is it right that council taxpayers simply pay for all of this?

West Ham's hopes of striking a deal to move into the 2012 Olympic Stadium after the Games received a huge boost today when British athletics chiefs put their official support behind the east London club's bid.

Chairman Ed Warner, who last week dismissed a rival bid from Tottenham Hotspur and 02 owners as "an insult to the whole Olympic project", said he had talked to several bidders.

But Warner has now decided to put all of his support behind the plans of , and entertainment giant .

Mr Warner said:

"What has impressed me so much about the joint bid from West Ham and Newham is their clear commitment to the spirit of the Olympic legacy and not just athletics at the elite end, but with the retention of the community track, our future champions and club runners too."

"It was clear from the start that only a partnership approach would bring to life the vision Seb Coe had when he committed to an athletics legacy in 2005 and we believe the collaboration of West Ham, Newham and UKA gives the strongest opportunity for a vibrant sporting legacy that will go well beyond 2012."

AEG executives have been very bullish about their bid together with Tottenham. But their plans not to leave an athletics track in the stadium angered Warner and I understand relations between UK Athletics and the entertainment company have been very strained.

London 2012's bid promised a major athletics legacy. The stadium is at the centre of Britain's bid for the 2015 world athletics championships and 2012 chairman Seb Coe's career in international athletics politics would be severely damaged if London was left with no legacy in the sport.

Live Nation, a serious rival to AEG which organises more than 20,000 concerts around the world every year, now looks in a much stronger position to snatch the stadium away from the 02 owners.

If Live Nation also takes over an indoor arena at the Olympic Park, it will make east London a music business battleground and the 02's position as the world's top music venue would come under pressure.

Tottenham are still keen to go ahead with their plans for a but the club appeared to be using the Olympic Stadium as another serious option because of hurdles to the north London project.

But Warner said West Ham's support for the 2015 World Championship bid was important.

West Ham United Vice-Chairman Karren Brady added:

"This is fantastic news. We believe ours is the only bid that can deliver London's legacy commitment to the International Olympic Committee. UKA's endorsement is a powerful and highly-valued testament of that.

"Our plan is not just to have a new stadium for West Ham but a real sporting centre for London and the rest of the country. We want to create a home of sport, featuring two of the greatest sports, football and athletics, side by side where they can grow and flourish together both in terms of spectatorship and participation at every level.

UKA have been great in helping us develop that vision over the past eight months and, together with Newham Council, we are ideally placed to make our dream a reality."

UK Athletics are still struggling to convince the Government and to support the world championship bid financially ahead of the Government's Spending Review on October 20. But it is very likely that some of the contingency cash from the £9.3 billion budget to build the facilities will be used for this.

UK Athletics needs London Mayor Boris Johnson and the Government to provide £8 million each to help stage the event.

This is a relatively small sum and it would be a huge embarrassment to 2012's pledge to stage major events in the stadium after the Games if it is not found.

91Èȱ¬ London 2012

Two of the world's giants in the entertainment industry have confirmed they are set for a fascinating battle to use the Olympic Stadium for concerts after the 2012 Games.

I broke the story in June that Live Nation, the world's biggest concert producer, was considering a bid to turn the Park into a major music venue.

have announced that they have reached an agreement with to put on concerts in the main stadium if the club wins the right to move in after 2014.

The decision follows an announcement last week by , the owners of the (the former Millennium Dome), that it has also put in a bid for the stadium together with .

This is a major commercial battle. AEG has turned the 02 into the and it certainly won't like the idea of a rival moving onto its patch just up the road.

Live Nation has major artists like Madonna, U2 and Lady Gaga but more importantly it runs about 140 venues around the world and puts on 20,000 concerts each year.

The fact is that the Olympic Park has better transport connections than the 02 which has struggled in recent months with .

With a massive new shopping centre on its doorstep, the Olympic Park will also have plenty of pre-concert entertainment for music fans.

What's interesting is whether Live Nation is going to be bidding for the handball arena too, as I was told in June.

That would give the company a major indoor arena as well as the outdoor concert venue. I am still waiting to get an answer on that.

91Èȱ¬ London 2012

For the last three years, I've been going down to a cycle path with a good view of the Olympic Park in east London to broadcast.

Now I don't expect any sympathy but for the first two years it was often a lonely and freezing place with few people around apart from a few security guards with dogs.

But the "Greenway" path has changed dramatically in the last 10 months.

Suddenly, thousands of . Suddenly, I'm far from alone.

In fact, there's a real buzz on the edge of the Park.

At least 10,000 people each month have been walking through the doors of a visitor centre which was built just 10 months ago.

Often there are no seats free in the café in the centre. People sit in the sun with a latte watching the diggers and trucks.

In short, the Olympic Park has become a major tourist attraction.

Tour guides are littered along the Greenway telling the story of the . You hear all sorts of languages being spoken - Danish, German, French, Italian and Japanese.

If you had told me this would happen a year ago, I would have politely suggested you'd been working too hard and needed a long holiday.

I never thought people would be so interested in the construction of a few sports venues.

Many of the people visiting are from outside of London. Many are also pensioners who are really interested in the Games.

But you don't need to pay for a guide to see all this if you don't want to. The visitor centre is free. It has a balcony with information boards with all the key buildings marked.

In December they are going to have a Christmas market along the Greenway. There are regular cultural events in the centre.

I have to admit, this is one of the most extraordinary developments I have seen around the 2012 Games.

If you get a chance, pop down to the Park and see it - on the DLR, one stop from Stratford Station.

West Ham v Spurs in 2010, but where will they be playing in 2015?

I never think you should say "Told you so" in life but I'm going to now because I got a lot of criticism when I broke the story in July that Tottenham were interested in moving into the 2012 Olympic Stadium after the Games.

I was accused of "not doing my research properly".

One blogging fan even suggested the 91Èȱ¬ should "start looking for another Olympic Correspondent that can actually find some real news".

I can understand the supporters taking that view, especially when a spokeswoman from Tottenham denied the club had put in a bid.

But I wasn't going to walk away from a story just because somebody is denying it, especially when I knew - from detailed research and talking to key people - that the club was still in the market.

And therefore - unlike other parts of the media - I wasn't surprised at all when put in an official bid last week together with the entertainment group , who run the 02 Arena - because I DID do my research and I DO talk to the people who matter in this Olympic business.

I don't actually think Spurs will move in to the stadium and I know from talking to fans that they don't want to leave .

But there is no doubt that the club is keeping a move to Stratford as an option until every detail of the expansion at the Lane is sorted out.

, of course, are the favourites to strike a deal with the and to start playing in Stratford from the 2014-15 season.

The other Olympic saga which had the same sort of inevitability about it as the Spurs bid has been 2012's determination to take the marathon route away from east London and run it around London's famous landmarks.

Finally, yesterday we got the confirmation that it will not be run through some of the poorest parts of the capital.

The races will start and finish in the Mall near Buckingham Palace and not go anywhere near the Olympic Stadium in east London.

Most Olympic marathons have finished in the main stadium in the past.

2012 deny this is all about better TV pictures.

They say they have changed their minds because of logistical problems. But the decision means the so-called "" have lost all of their three big promises from organisers.

In addition to the marathon, the borough was supposed to get a basketball training venue and a race walking event through its streets.

Now, instead of competitors running past their doorsteps, the locals are only getting a place on the - the VIPs will race past them in special cars in Olympic lanes on their way to Stratford.

The council is furious and Lord Coe, the 2012 chairman, says he is talking to officials about special events around the torch relay.

But every part of London - and Britain - will get a share of the torch relay. It's hardly a replacement for a real sporting event in your back yard.

East London was promised a lot by the bid and a bunch of schoolchildren from Olympic boroughs were taken to Singapore to help the successful presentation.

You can understand that many are disappointed that these promises are now being watered down.

Believe me, the frustration of east Londoners is 100 times more important as any irritation I might feel at being criticised for getting a story right!

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