Adopt an Olympic family

Thousands of Londoners will be asked to put up the families of Olympic athletes if we get the Games.

The 2012 bid team believe the capital's amazing ethnic diversity makes it ideal to play host to Olympians and their relatives.

London 2012 commercial director Charlie Wijeratna said a "home stay programme" would be set up to enhance community spirit throughout the three weeks of the Olympics.

He said: "This is going to be a voluntary-programme where we are going to ask Londoners to make accommodation available to athletes' families free of charge."

The scheme is aimed at countering concerns that many families of athletes will be unable to afford accommodation in one of the world's most expensive cities.

Mr Wijeratna added: "We will try to match up people's cultural and sporting interests and language skills to offer a unique cultural experience for athletes' families visiting London."

Delegates from the International Olympic Committee today scrutinised London's proposed 17,223-bed athletes' village and plans to accommodate hundreds of thousands of spectators.

The bid team said the plans had been well received. They also revealed they have signed legal guarantees on the pricing of 30,000 hotel rooms to prevent unscrupulous hotel groups cashing in on the demand for accommodation in August 2012. This means that a typical three-star room, currently £59 a night, will cost around £70 excluding VAT. A four-star room would be £104 and a fivestar room would be £157.

This is three-quarters of the 40,000 rooms they are required to set aside under Olympic rules.

But it means that with up to 500,000 domestic and international spectators expected each day, many spectators could still struggle to get cheap rooms, though there should be no shortage of accommodation.

At present there are 130,000 hotel rooms in London, with planning permission already granted for an extra 20,000 - many of them in or around east London.

Simon Clegg, chief executive of the British Olympic Association, was pleased with the way the meeting with the delegates went.

He said: "I felt we provided the answers thoroughly, with confidence and robustly.

"Certainly from the body language and the discussions I had they seemed to be extremely satisfied with the way we handled the question and answer session."

The 13-strong International Olympic Committee delegation was today examining the proposed Olympic venues. They were visiting Stratford, the site of the planned 80,000-seat stadium and athletes' village, the Dome, Wimbledon, Wembley, Lord's and Horse Guards Parade. The delegates were going by coach but were using the Jubilee line to reach the Dome.