National Lottery Bill

I am grateful to the noble Lord for the clarification of the situation. It gives me licence to roam in reply. Amendment No. 22 is concerned with the Secretary of State’s order-making power in new Section 36B(3), which is inserted by Clause 14. That power allows her to limit the amounts or proportions of money that the Big Lottery Fund may spend on different types of prescribed expenditure. Amendment No. 22 would remove the Secretary of State’s power to specify maximum and minimum amounts. To reply to the amendment, it is necessary to explain why this order-making power is necessary. The noble Lord will recall from when we discussed Clause 7 that the new good cause is extremely broad, as we recognised. We need to be able to set out, at the highest level, the types of expenditure on which the Big Lottery Fund should focus. Clause 7 allows us to do that. The order-making power in Clause 14, which would in practice be exercised at the same time as that in Clause 7, allows us to limit the amounts or proportions of money that the Big Lottery Fund may distribute on the different types of prescribed expenditure. Without this power the fund could, in theory, spend all its money on one type of prescribed expenditure—for example, transformational grants. We do not, of course, expect it to do that, and it would be unreasonable for it to do so. In practice, the power in this clause will be used in only a small number of cases, where it is particularly important to specify the levels of funding. The Secretary of State plans to use this power to specify the maximum amount of money that the fund should spend on transformational grants and the minimum amount it should spend on the Awards for All scheme. Our intention is clearly set out in the illustrative order that we have made available to the House and which we propose to introduce after Royal Assent. The amounts specified were proposed by the Big Lottery Fund, not by the Government. This power is about providing assurance to the public, not dictating to the fund how to spend its money. The fund has asked us to take this power. I can say quite categorically that we do not intend to specify amounts or proportions of money in relation to the three main funding themes. Since any orders made under these powers will be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure, they will be subject to full parliamentary scrutiny. I hope I have reassured the noble Lord about the purposes behind the maximum and minimum levels that we are seeking. This power was suggested by the Big Lottery Fund. It will be used very sparingly indeed and, whenever it is deployed, it will be subject to Parliament’s consent under affirmative orders. I hope that that clarifies the issue for the noble Lord.