§ Mr. SimonTo ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what assessment she has made of the fair share initiative in terms of its capacity to distribute National Lottery funds equitably. [126111]
§ Estelle MorrisI view the fair share initiative as an important tool in ensuring that those communities at greatest disadvantage do not lose out from Lottery funding. Since its launch in April 2002, 77 areas across the UK have been identified to be targeted under the initiative through three programmes operated by the Community Fund and New Opportunities Fund. Over £31 million has been distributed through the 337W Community Fund's grants programmes targeted at fair share areas; grants of between £200,000 and £2.2 million have been committed under the New Opportunities Fund's fair share: Transforming Your Space programme; and a £50 million fair share Trust has been set up, to be delivered by the Community Foundation Network. Now that the building blocks of the three strands of funding are in place, I expect to see a steady increase in the flow of funding over the remaining two years of the initiative.