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Mr. Lansley: The hon. Gentleman is explaining the essential character of the various projects that the Government propose to fund from the lottery. If they are so integral to the performance of their respective tasks, why does the hon. Gentleman conclude that the Government considered it wrong for them to be funded by taxpayers' money? Why did the Government not think that they were so valuable that they should be financed by mainstream programmes?
Mr. Thomas: With respect, it is a bit rich to be asked that question by a Conservative Member. The Conservative party claims that such provision is core provision. Why have three quarters of pupils in my constituency no access to after-school clubs? I accept that
that is partly due to the incompetence of the Liberal Democrats who currently run the council, but I fear that it is mostly due to the fact that the Conservative party never demonstrated any intention of funding such clubs. The funding, therefore, is clearly additional.
The White Paper refers to the high quality of our scientists, but our continuing inability to translate their talent into business ideas is a powerful raison d'etre for NESTA.
I also welcome the changes in practice for existing distributors. The ability for distributors to lay down clear strategies based on need and to set out how they intend to distribute funds will enable more efficient use of lottery funds to develop initiatives where they are needed and where they will be of most benefit.
Mr. John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington):
Does my hon. Friend agree that there has been a distribution problem, not for inner-city areas or leafy suburbs, but for peripheral urban areas, such as his constituency and mine? For 18 years, such areas were neglected by central Government funding, and neglected in the allocation of awards, sometimes because of a lack of applications. Does he also agree that there is a need for capacity building in such communities to elicit applications, and for special concentration on peripheral areas?
Mr. Thomas:
I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. I welcome the requirement for distributor boards to prepare strategies so that they can focus on and address the needs of peripheral areas.
The ability of lottery distributors to solicit applications to support their strategic aims is a sensible innovation. It will help to ensure that lobbying by the new army of lottery consultants does not mean that only the loudest, largest and most articulate groups win funding.
We must refocus lottery distributors so that their structures are more effectively in contact with local communities, and so that decisions can be taken more quickly, feedback and advice can be given more effectively and people and activity can be concentrated on, rather than bricks and mortar.
Small sporting clubs do not need new club houses; they need access to good coaches or small amounts of crucial equipment. The Bill will allow distributors to provide vouchers, which might help clubs and community groups to develop the talents and skills of leaders, be they coaches or scout leaders, and, in turn, enable them to develop the skills and talents of club members.
There is widespread public support for changes in the lottery. The public want a more equitable distribution of lottery funds. At present, there are serious disparities in funding, by locality and by size and type of project. Health, education and the environment have been excluded for no logical reason, when they are what the people of Britain care about most passionately.
Mr. Peter Viggers (Gosport):
I suppose that someone has to say it: I dislike the national lottery. It puts decisions about public money into unelected hands, and introduces a random hand in expenditure, which is unaccountable--within limits: if an allocation of funds in not particularly popular, Ministers have nothing to do with it; if an announcement is popular, Ministers are always in the photograph.
I should much prefer no lottery at all. It was originally argued that we had to have our own state lottery because other gambling and other state lotteries would come into the United Kingdom and take British money if we did not. I was unpersuaded by that argument, and still feel distaste for the British Government's sponsorship of a lottery, which lowers the tone of government by putting the authority of the state behind the concept of gambling.
And gambling it is: 30 million people a week--two thirds of households--take part. My hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk (Mr. Prior) referred to an average bet of £3, but £5 or £6 per household per week goes into this vast money machine, which gives gamblers a negligible chance of winning.
In December 1992, the Secretary of State for National Heritage said:
The profile of those who pay shows an emphasis on those with lower incomes and capital, and the analysis of those who benefit shows a heavy slant to the more privileged. The lottery is redistributive, and I regret that.
I should have preferred the Government to have the courage years ago to decide on good causes, to find the money, and to come to the House of Commons to explain what major projects they proposed to support. Projects such as the magnificent one at the Louvre in France deserve support, but I should prefer hon. Members to debate them in the House.
The hon. Member for Harrow, West (Mr. Thomas) referred to the development of the new and burdensome industry of advisers and consultants, who assist local authorities and others to make lottery bids. Applicants are encouraged to shape their bid to make it more attractive to those who might provide the money, and advisers even encourage institutions to reorganise and restructure, so that they are more likely to be an acceptable bidder. Many bidders spend good money to reshape themselves, and that dead money is of value to no one.
If we are to have a lottery, how should it be structured? The 1978 royal commission defined worthy causes as those which
The planning stage has gone through, and building work will proceed later in the year. This £86 million project has £40 million of support from the lottery. I should have much preferred it to come out of public funds rather than lottery funds, but the project is exactly in accordance with the original test of additionality.
What is planned under the Bill? The siphoning off of £1 billion, which is in excess of the original expected lottery yield of £9 billion, has been justified by the Prime Minister, who said:
The Government propose the New Opportunities Fund and the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, and they will spend the money as they think fit. They are also tightening their grip on every aspect of expenditure of lottery funds. Clause 12 provides that the Secretary of State will give instructions about a strategic plan, which must be submitted to the Secretary of State for consultation, after which a body must
"The lottery will not attract the gambler. We expect it to attract a new section of the population, people who are willing to have a flutter knowing that--win or lose--money will be going to good causes."
Some flutter: £15,000 million is spent, often by people who can ill afford £5 or £6 a week per household. It saddens me that the turnover in lottery tickets is busiest in the most deprived areas. Self-evidently, people hope for a miracle to escape financial disadvantage--it is tax by another name.
"however desirable, would not ordinarily be financed by Government"
because
"they would distort the priorities the Government had set itself."
7 Apr 1998 : Column 220
The commentator, Sir Robin Day, said that the idea was worthy because it would support projects that would
My noble Friend Lord Baker, when Home Secretary, said of the money from the lottery:
"bridge the gap between public funds and private philanthropy in those many areas of national life where additional expenditure may be described as desirable but not essential."
"I must emphasise that this will be additional funding. The Government do not intend that the money provided by the lottery should substitute for existing expenditure programmes."
Following those principles, I cannot imagine a better cause than the Millennium Commission's sponsorship of the plan to redevelop the entrance to Portsmouth harbour and the Gosport area in my constituency. One does not have to stuff presents from Father Christmas back up the chimney because one does not believe in him. The plan is imaginative; it is a sweeping vision, with promenades for Gosport and for Portsmouth, new open and leisure areas and spectacular water features, which will be dominated by a tall, elegant tower reminiscent of a sailing spinnaker.
"It is the people's lottery. It should address the people's priorities."
On message as always, the Secretary of State for Social Security said:
"It is the public's money, and the public want it spent on high-quality child care."
I join my right hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major), who attacked the "people's this, people's that" attitude; an increasing number of people find such extraordinarily cheap populism offensive.
"make such modifications to the draft as it considers necessary or expedient."
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude) said, the Secretary of State will tighten his control over the distribution of lottery funds. The Secretary of State will discover that, in the annual bilateral meetings with the Treasury, it in turn will tighten its control over him. The Treasury will lean on him, and, as always, it will win. The lottery will become a voluntary tax paid substantially by poorer people, and promoted by the Government as a game. I find that very sad.
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