If that's a serious proposal, it isn't one that's been put to the Conference Committee (of which I'm acting chair, and which is overseeing the bid). We just had a two-hour meeting and it wasn't raised once. 
 
Harry Mitchell
http://enwp.org/User:HJ
Phone: 024 7698 0977
Skype: harry_j_mitchell


From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@gmail.com>
To: HJ Mitchell <hjmitchell@ymail.com>; Wikimania general list (open subscription) <wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Sunday, 26 August 2012, 16:45
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] UK budget plan for 2014 Wikimania bid

On 26 August 2012 16:34, HJ Mitchell <hjmitchell@ymail.com> wrote:
> Nobody is seriously talking about spending £40k on the bid. As far as I can
> tell, the number was plucked out of thin air. I've just come from a two-hour
> meeting with the bid committee, where the idea of spending ~£17k on the bid
> was discussed. Even that's not a formal proposal - it's something that's
> being investigated, along with other options, and will have to undergo
> extensive discussion before we even get to the stage of asking the WMUK
> board to approve it, and which faces considerable opposition (including, to
> some extent, from me) even at this stage.

Have you looked at the budget proposal from the bid committee (I
linked to it earlier in this thread)? That £17k is just for paying the
professional conference organiser and it in addition to a proposed
£45k to go to the bid committee themselves to pay them for their time.
As far as I can tell, that is a serious proposal from the bid
committee. It is linked to from their minutes with the title "budget
proposal agreed".