Your work leading up to and during the period of the Games has been exemplary. Indeed it's hard to imagine the summer being so great a success without your unceasing effort. The entire nation joins with me in thanking you for a job well done. And by the way, sorry, you're sacked.
To all the staff at LOCOG who worked tirelessly to organise the entire event, your years of preparation certainly paid off. To the planners who plotted what should go where when, to the office staff who made the tea and readied the files, to the risk assessors who mitigated our summer, to the diplomats who got the politicians to agree, to the techies who kept the website online, to the sustainability experts who factored in legacy, to the financial staff who made the numbers add up, to the cleaners who hoovered the office every evening. We couldn't have run the Games without you, no way, but you're suddenly entirely superfluous. You're all sacked forthwith, on the scrapheap by October.
To all the security staff employed by G4S, we know you weren't the problem, we know you'd have worked from the start had bosses been more competent. We know there were hundreds of you milling around in over-large groups, doing nothing obviously useful, but keeping the peace all the same. We know the Games got you off your sofas and into employment, providing invaluable income for a couple of months. But best go looking for something other means of support now, because you're sacked too.
To all the catering staff in the Park serving up overpriced noodles, you're sacked. To the sales assistants selling £28 t-shirts and cuddly Wenlocks, you're sacked. To the blokes who went round emptying the recycling bins, and the girls flogging programmes, you're sacked. To the drama students who bigged-up the Coca Cola pavilion, and the staff who wheeled the bottled water on little trollies, you're sacked. To the gardeners who made the flowers look so pretty, some of you might actually be kept on into legacy, but the rest of you, obviously, you're sacked.
To the folk in pink tabards hovering round station platforms directing occasional passengers to their events, we don't need you any more. To the backroom boys who shuffled the trains into the right position and added extra buses, your work is done. To the barrier putter-uppers, the sign-erectors, the lane-painters, the bunting manufacturers and whoever the lucky company was contracted to provide us with big tents, we've no more money for any of you either. We hope you enjoyed your period of employment, but you knew it was only ever going to be temporary.
To all the staff at Ticketmaster who came up with that dog's breakfast of a ticket ordering website, sadly you're not sacked. To the bus drivers we borrowed from elsewhere, you can go back to Bristol, Stockport, Dundee or wherever. To the Games Makers and Ambassadors, you were only ever volunteers in the first place. But to everyone else, goodbye.
We hope that the time you've spent with London 2012 will look good on your CVs, for some even magnificent. But the government's giant influx of public money is now over, and they simply can't support mass levels of over-employment ever again. If August has seen a local blip in the unemployment figures, rest assured it'll go rocketing back up again now. Because you're sacked.
Thank you for everything you did for London 2012. The commitment and talents you displayed were amazing. We hope you enjoyed your temporary financial distraction from austerity. But it's time for economic reality to kick in again, indeed it's never really gone away. For those of you now out of work - which is all of you, remember - London 2013's not looking very good at all.
MEMO: To all Olympic and Paralympic staff
