I joined the Commission in the summer of 2007, knowing the London Olympic and Paralympic Games were 5 years away but still excited as a sports fan to be involved with the biggest sporting event in the world. As someone who is passionate about sustainability, I was also excited to be involved in assuring the sustainability of it. Now it’s equally amazing and exciting, if slightly trepidating, that the Games are underway and it’s all happening.
Â
As I’ve been on the journey from 2007 to now there have been many occasions when I’ve had to step back and think “just when I thought I’d got my head around the size and scale of the Games, it’s actually much bigger than that!” You can imagine a number of people from Rio will be walking round the Olympic Park and other venues over the next couple of weeks thinking “wow, have we really committed to delivering all this?!â€
Â
One of my jobs in the Commission has been to keep track of all the sustainability commitments London 2012 has made, all the recommendations the Commission has made, and how all of these are being delivered. This has been a challenging task and I sometimes think our Chair asks me about commitments in obscure areas every so often just to test out my knowledge – and then liken me to Bernard from Yes Prime Minister when I quote back the detailed commitment!
Â
Now after all this time of providing assurance over what is to come, we are assuring the main event itself and seeing how the Games-time commitments are being delivered. I think like a lot of people involved in the Games there is some trepidation at this moment but the excitement of seeing it all happening outweighs that.
So let the Games commence!
Jonathan Turner
July 2012