Swathes of empty seats may be filled by troops

Members of the military are being brought in at the last minute, students and teachers from the local area are also being invited and other fans could have their tickets upgraded, organisers said.

Tickets for double sessions, such as those for hockey, basketball, water polo and handball, are also being recycled and re-sold as people leave, in a system similar to than in use at Wimbledon.

Yesterday there were gaps again at events including the swimming but Lord Coe insisted it was still early days as critics continued to question how tickets had been allocated.

Officials had said on Saturday that those seats left empty were believed to belong to accredited groups such as governing bodies and the media.

“Let’s put this in perspective. Those venues are stuffed to the gunwales. The public are in there,” Lord Coe added.

British Olympic Association chairman Lord Moynihan said “we owe it to the team” to ensure the seats are filled.

“We need every seat filled. We owe it to the team, we owe it to British sports fans the length and breadth of the country to make sure they get the opportunity to come to this unique occasion at the Olympic Games.”

Lord Coe added: “We take it seriously. I don’t want to see swathes of those seats empty and that’s why we will make sure, where we possibly can, people are in those seats when they are not used.”

He said just eight per cent of tickets had gone to sponsors while 75 per cent were “in the hands of the public”. Sponsors and other accredited officials were still trying to figure out what their days looked like and when they would be able to attend.

“This morning was a very good example,” he said. “We looked at gymnastics, we could see at this moment there are empty seats in the accredited area – the rest of the venue is looking pretty good, there’s a good atmosphere.

“So we were able to move those troops from – I’m not quite sure whether they were on a rest period or whether it was a transition from work through to a rest period – but they’re sitting there enjoying the gymnastics.”

Matt and Amanda Casson, from London, watched yesterday morning’s swimming heats at the Aquatics Centre but said it was disappointing there were noticeable gaps in the arena.

Mr Casson, 36, said: “They should do something like they do at Wimbledon where at a certain time they put them on sale to the general public, just re-sell them. Or even if they upgraded people downwards, closer to the front, to fill them, that would look better.”

An urgent investigation was launched after large gaps were visible at a number of venues on the first full day of competition. The row over the empty seats comes despite the International Olympic Committee (IOC) vowing to avoid a repeat of the scandal that saw many stadiums left empty at the Beijing Games four years ago.

And the Government has expressed concern as to why the seats were not taken despite events being apparently sold out.

Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the empty seats were “very disappointing” and suggested they could be offered to members of the public. “Locog are doing a full investigation into what happened. I think it was accredited seats that belonged to sponsors, but if they’re not going to turn up, we want those tickets to be available for members of the public, because that creates the best atmosphere.”

But Mark Adams, of the IOC, said: “It’s completely wrong to say this is a sponsors issue.” Those who failed to turn up on Saturday were sports organisations from around the world, the media, “a handful of sponsors” and others, he said.

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