West Ham Deny 2012 Stadium Corruption Claims

West Ham have denied any wrongdoing over claims of improper payments during the football club's successful bid to run the Olympic Stadium after the 2012 Games.

The club said they are taking legal action against Tottenham Hotspur and The Sunday Times over allegations surrounding the validity of the east London stadium bidding process.

They said it was treating claims made by the newspaper "with the utmost seriousness" and insisted it was "certain of the robustness" of its successful bid.

A spokesman for the paper said: "The Sunday Times stands by its story and will rigorously defend any action taken against us."

The Olympic Park Legacy Company (OPLC) board, in charge of securing the future of the Olympic Park site, voted 14-0 in February to make the Hammers the first choice to move into the £486m stadium.

The Sunday Times claimed West Ham paid £20,000 into an OPLC executive's bank account before and after it won the right to own the stadium after the Games.

Sky News reporter Enda Brady said: "The allegations in the Sunday Times are namely that a female employee of OPLC received £20,000 in cash into her bank account from West Ham United Football Club.

"The same woman as we understand it is a girlfriend of a director of West Ham United.

"It is our understanding that the man and woman have both been suspended since these allegations were put to them on Friday."

The OPLC announced on Friday that it had suspended an employee after it was discovered she was working as a consultant for West Ham United during the stadium bid.

It said: "It has come to our attention that an employee of the Olympic Park Legacy Company has been undertaking paid consultancy work for West Ham United FC.

"The company had no knowledge of this work and no permission was given to undertake it. This individual had no involvement whatsoever in our stadium process.

"The individual concerned had declared a personal relationship with an employee of West Ham United FC when she joined the organisation and we therefore put robust measures in place to ensure our stadium process was not compromised.

"The stadium team has been based at our law firm Eversheds' offices in the City and only the stadium team had access to information about the bids.

"As soon as this new information came to light the company took immediate action and launched an independent investigation."

West Ham, who were in a head-to-head contest with Tottenham Hotspur, stressed their belief that the bidding process had not been compromised.

They said it undertook an initial internal investigation which established that the work carried out by the individual was "not connected in any way to the bidding process for the Olympic Stadium but procurement project management thereafter".

The club added: "We are of the firm view that the integrity of the bidding process has not been compromised. We consider that the bidding process was robust and believe that remains the case."