On Friday, November 21, at the behest of Nations and Regions Coordinator, Tanya, I was in the impressive Dolphin Centre in sunny Darlington, for a Local Authority London 2012 event. This was a result of a local partnership between Tier One partner Lloyds TSB, ONE NorthEast, Sport England, the Assoc. of NE Councils and Public Health NE - designed to explore how London 2012 could benefit communities and businesses in the region.

Although I didn't see any dolphins in the swimming pool on site, I did however see a ground swell of excitement over how the Games in 2012 might stimulate innovative work across many different sectors in the North East.

To start the day, Chair Cllr Linda Ebbatson introduced Cllr Ian Haszeldine, Mayor of Darlington, who set the scene before introducing Jeremy Beeton, Director General of the Government Olympic Executive. Jeremy took the audience on a whistle stop tour of the London 2012 journey to date, from the development of the bid, to Singapore and the elation in Traflagar Sq. and elsewhere in the UK, following the announcement of London as Host City for the next Games. He described developments in the Olympic Park and explained the complicated workings of the Government budget for London 2012.



Jeremy then took the local councillors through the Government's legacy promises and explained how in particular those promises relating to sport, young people, creativity, tourism and business applied just as much outside of London, as within the M25.

Following Jeremy's useful overview, Ian Thurlbeck, of Sport England, gave a local perspective and explained how the Nations and Regions Group had been set up to support local initiatives with links to 2012. Ian was followed by Peter Heywood, Director of Public Health for Middlesbrough Council, who explained how the decline in sports and physical activity means young people in the UK may have a life expectancy less than their parents. Peter went on to describe how a local partnership run project was aiming to beat Type 2 Diabetes in the area, through the promotion of increased physical activity. This project has now applied for the 'Inspire' mark.

Miriam Stanley, Senior Manager at Lloyds TSB, then presented Lloyd's vision as Tier One partner of London 2012 and emphasised the links between communities and business. Miriam outlined the challenge for local companies to grow in order to gain 2012 contracts, and in doing so providing opportunities to generate new jobs locally.

There was no need for an introduction for local hero Steve Cram, who talked about his experience from being a medal winning athlete, to being a member of the media at the Olympic Games. Steve said how impressed he'd been in Beijing, at how the hosts focussed primarily on the experience for the athletes and for the media, making it, from that perspective, the best of the six Games he'd attended. He expressed his excitement at Team GB's success and he challenged the audience to compete to provide more facilities to attract high performance sport to the region.



Finally, Dawn Peart took the group through her journey, from Swimming Development Officer at Newcastle Council, to being seconded by British Swimming to the role of Senior Team Manager of the British Swimming team at Beijing. An amazing story.

The audience then broke into syndicate groups, to workshop local opportunities surrounding culture, volunteering, health and sport, and business.

As I made my way back to the train station, following another inspiring day in the Nations and Regions, I passed the ornamental canopy of the Civic Theatre Building, which has been providing cultural stimulation to a voracious local community since 1907. I reflected on the question 'Who put the 'darling' into Darlington?', the answer to which would have to have been the theatre's first Managing Director, an Italian ex-pat named Signor Rino Pepi. Buonissimo, Don Pepi!