Background
In 1992 the Home Office published the White Paper 'A National Lottery Raising Money for Good Causes'.
The National Lottery Act 1993 established five good causes to benefit from the Lottery: sport, the arts, heritage, charities and projects to mark the year 2000 and the beginning of the third millennium.
The National Lottery Act 1998 created a sixth good cause allowing Lottery money to fund innovative projects in health, education and environment and a new distributor, the New Opportunities Fund, to allocate it.
The Act also:
- changed the Lottery distributors' responsibility and powers and allowed them to produce strategic plans for funding;
- allowed them to be more proactive by enabling them to solicit applications for Lottery grants;
- allowed them to delegate grant decisions to other bodies;
- allowed them to enter into jointly funded schemes with each other;
- and created the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA). NESTA helps talented individuals in the fields of science, technology and the arts to achieve their potential and helps people turn inventions and ideas into products and services that can be effectively exploited.
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Roles and Responsibilities
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has responsibility within Government for National Lottery policy, including the legislation governing the National Lottery. The Rt Hon Richard Caborn MP is the minister responsible for National Lottery issues.
We set the policy and financial framework within which the distributing bodies for National Lottery grants operate. The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport issues policy and financial directions to the English and UK wide Lottery distributing bodies. These Policy Directions set the broad framework within which the distributing bodies operate and require them to consider certain matters in determining the persons to whom and the purposes for which and the conditions under which the body distributes Lottery money.
The Financial Directions are concerned with financial propriety and efficiency and are designed to secure the proper management and control by a distributing body of the Lottery funds available to it.
The Lottery distributing bodies in Wales,Scotland have their policy directions issued to them by the Welsh Assembly and the Scottish Parliament respectively. As the Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended, the policy directions for distributing bodies for Northern Ireland are issued by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport in London.
We also sponsor the National Lottery Commission, which regulates the National Lottery game and the game operator. The Commission's duties are to protect players' interests, to ensure that the Lottery is run properly, and to maximise the amount raised for good causes.
We do not give out Lottery money. Lottery money is given out by number of independent National Lottery distributing bodies.
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National Lottery distributing bodies
The proceeds of the National Lottery support the arts, heritage, sport, charities and community and voluntary groups as well as supporting projects concerned with health, education and the environment.
There are currently 14 independent distributing bodies responsible for distributing Lottery money. These are: Sport England; Sport Scotland; the Sports Council for Wales; the Sports Council for Northern Ireland; UK Sport; Arts Council England; Arts Council of Wales; Arts Council of Northern Ireland; Scottish Arts Council; Scottish Screen; the UK Film Council: the Millennium Commission; the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Big Lottery Fund.
These bodies make their grant decisions independently of Government and of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and in response to applications for funding which they receive. They also make their decisions based on the published criteria of each of their different Lottery funding programmes.
To apply for grant you can contact the relevant distributing body through the Lottery Funding website by telephoning the National Lottery Funding Hotline on 0845 275 0000.
Following the announcement that the 2012 Olympic Games will be hosted by London, an additional distribution body has been established - the Olympic Lottery Distributor.
The Olympic Lottery Distributor's role it is to fund any facility, function or service it considers necessary or practical for the delivery of the 2012 Olympic Games and will monitor grants to ensure they are spent effectively.
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The National Lottery Commission
The National Lottery Commission (NLC) is a non-departmental public body and is responsible for regulating the National Lottery in accordance with legislation, regulatory and policy directions from the Secretary of State. It does so independently of Government. The Commission replaced the previous regulator, the Director General of the National Lottery on 1 April 1999.
Details of the current chair of the NLC and the five commissioners can be found on the National Lottery Commission's website.
The National Lottery Commission's duties are:
- To ensure that the National Lottery is run with all due propriety
- To protect players' interests
- Subject to satisfying the first two criteria, to ensure that as much money as possible is raised for the good causes
The National Lottery Commission's role includes:
- Selecting the Lottery operator, setting the terms of its licence and ensuring that it complies with those terms
- Vetting individuals and companies associated with the National Lottery to ensure that they are 'fit and proper'
- Licensing individual games that form part of the National Lottery
- Ensuring that the National Lottery operator pays the right amount of money into the National Lottery Distribution Fund.
The National Lottery operator Camelot Group plc has been running the National Lottery game since it was awarded the licence in 1994. Its second seven year licence started on 27 January 2002.
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