Member Article

Plans for the NewcastleGateshead World Cup bid outlined

Newcastle and Gateshead have outlined their proposal for hosting World Cup football games, with the plans to be delivered to the FA at Wembley on Wednesday.

The city hopes the 2018/2022 bid will bring “enormous benefit” to all businesses in the region, and with 24 billion watching the last World Cup in Germany, the city will get mass coverage on a global scale.

Coun John Shipley, the leader of Newcastle City Council, said: “There’s a major capital gain, which is probably about five times the cost that it would be for us to mount the world cup, so in financial terms it’s a winner for everybody.

“There’ll be enormous benefit in terms of the income to all those who trade in the city, so it’s not just about hotel bedrooms - it’s about all the spending that they’ll have in the shops, and the cultural attractions, and so on. All the bars, the cafes, and the restaurants will see a major boost in their income.”

The Tyneside bid comes alongside a separate bid from Sunderland, with the two World Cup bids hopeful that both cities will be able to host matches, providing a massive double boost to the region.

Newcastle and England star Peter Beardsley said: “It would be incredible for everybody in the North East. Niall Quinn was on last week announcing Sunderland’s launch, and why can’t we both do it? It would be fantastic.”

One of the main strengths of the Newcastle and Gateshead bid is that most, if not all, of the infrastructure is already in the city, as David Faulkner, chair of the Champions Group explained.

He said: “A lot of it is in place and that’s one of our real strengths. We talk about transport and we’ve got investment coming in to improve the Metro system, for example, which will continue up until the 2018 bid.

“We’re capitalising on a really strong infrastructure of transport and hotels that we already have in place, with plans to improve that between now and the World Cup.

“We’re not entirely dependent on someone saying ‘congratulations on winning it NewcastleGateshead. Here, have some money and tart yourself up a bit’ - actually we’ve got a lot to offer.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .