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Cost of the Olympics quadruples to £10billion

Last updated at 22:52pm on 28.02.07

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Artists' impressions of the venues for the 2012 Olympics.

The likely bill for the London Olympics has shot up again to £10billion, according to latest estimates.

Insiders said International Olympic Committee officials, who arrived in the capital yesterday for a two-day meeting, were so concerned that they are demanding a full breakdown of costs from 2012 chairman Lord Coe.

At Prime Minister's Questions yesterday, Tony Blair was challenged by Tory MP David Evennett on the soaring bill - originally estimated at £2.375billion by ministers.

Mr Blair replied: 'Obviously it's important that we keep the costs properly under control.'

The bill for staging the games and regenerating Stratford, where the Olympic Park will be, is now understood to stand at £6.1billion. On top of this, the Treasury is demanding a contingency fund of £2.7billion.

The cost of security - decided before the July 7 attacks - has rocketed from £190million to £1billion, while there is a VAT bill on construction costs of at least £250million.

Sir Steve Redgrave, the five-time Olympic rowing champion, also joined the row yesterday.

He said: 'I have found it frustrating and I will be very satisfied when they say, "this is the budget, this is the money we have got to spend".

'If you were building a house or an extension you would have a budget to spend. I think the British public would prefer that.'

And Tory Olympics spokesman Hugh Robertson said: 'The indications are that the Government is trying to fudge the budget by stripping out costs to keep the headline figure down.'

A Government spokesman said the predictions were 'a mixture of pure speculation and misunderstanding' and an announcement on the true cost would be made 'in due course'.