§ 8. Mr. Mike Gapes (Ilford, South)What steps he will take to reduce the variations between (a) sales of national lottery tickets and (b) average expenditure of the National Lottery Charities Board in parliamentary constituencies. [158143]
§ The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Chris Smith)It is important to bear in mind that 28p of each lottery pound goes to the good causes overall. It is also difficult to seek a direct correlation between ticket sales and the value of lottery awards, as all parts of the country should have access to lottery funding according to need. However, our commitment to ensuring that lottery funding is fairly distributed both geographically and across all groups of society is reflected in the changes made to lottery distribution through the National Lottery Act 1998 and the revised policy directions issued to distributors in summer 1998.
§ Mr. GapesIs my right hon. Friend aware that my constituents in Ilford, South are very generous towards the national lottery? The most recent figures that I have, compiled at the end of 1999, showed that £759 per adult was spent on the lottery, which put us 68th highest constituency in the country. However, we received back only 4p in the pound for projects in my constituency. Will my right hon. Friend have urgent discussions with the London board of the community fund about the disparities in payment between London boroughs and the fact that some constituencies and boroughs, including my own, are not getting their fair share of payments?
§ Mr. SmithI am pleased to tell my hon. Friend that the picture is now a little better than the one that he described. His constituency has received overall from the national lottery so far £3.9 million and 77 lottery awards. However, he is right to draw attention to the fact that that is somewhat below the average for the country as a whole. Among the changes introduced by the National Lottery Act 1998 were a greater emphasis on small-scale schemes 638 at local community level to enable a much better spread across the country as a whole, a move away from an emphasis on buildings—bricks and mortar—to support for people and activities, and an attempt to ensure that areas of social deprivation can be particularly helped by the lottery distributors.
Those changes are already beginning to have an impact. For example, during the past year, the number of small grants made by the lottery distributors has trebled. I am delighted by the progress that is already being made; I hope that it will continue and that it will benefit Ilford, South as well as other parts of the country.
§ Mr. Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale, West)The Secretary of State has just made it clear that one of his criteria for fairness in allocating lottery resources is redistribution of wealth from better off areas to less well off areas. That may be a legitimate thing to do, but I do not think that many people who buy lottery tickets are aware of that. Will the Secretary of State publish the criteria that are used to decide where the money goes so that the process is open and transparent and people cannot accuse the Government or the National Lottery Charities Board of wrongly distributing funds?
§ Mr. SmithThe directions to which I referred were placed in both Libraries of both Houses some two years ago. If the hon. Gentleman has not seen them yet, he has not been doing his homework.