My Lords, I am not in a position of having to thank many noble Lords for taking part in this enormous debate; nevertheless, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and my noble friend for replying.
It was clear from the debate in Grand Committee that your Lordships did not appreciate the importance of the issue, and it is clear that your Lordships have not appreciated its importance today. It is, however, clear that over the past few years, while the voice of the BBC in your Lordships’ House has increased significantly, the volume of sound that comes from the charity sector has, sadly, reduced.
Society lottery regulations were designed 40 years ago, when society had rather a different view of gambling. The gambling industry has changed beyond recognition —in particular, the Government themselves are now the largest player in that industry through their ownership and promotion of the National Lottery. In his answer, my noble friend made it clear that protecting the National Lottery is rather more important than any of the other issues on the table.
The noble Lord, Lord Collins, made some useful comments in taking this debate forward. However, I say to him that the information on ticket sales—the number of sales, which charity the money goes to and what percentage of the money goes to the charity—is in the public domain. Every charity files a return to the Gambling Commission, which is put on its website. Any member of the public can see exactly where the money has gone, how much was raised and how much went out in prizes. It is a requirement of regulations that societies do that and there is no question that that should not be changed. There is no reason why that should not continue. I am sure that the noble Lord knows that every charity lottery ticket has the name of the charity written on it. It is not difficult to tell where the money is going.
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I say to the noble Lord, Lord Collins, that the Health Lottery is not making use of a loophole. It was Parliament’s intention that external lottery managers and organisations should be set up to operate lotteries on behalf of groups of charities. Although Mr Desmond may be very unpopular in certain areas—certainly, by
the sound of it, in the Select Committee in another place—there is no doubt that what he is doing is exactly what Parliament intended he should do when the amendments were passed in 1994. If the Government and Parliament wish to review that, by all means they should do so.
It is also worth saying that, rather than posing a threat to the National Lottery, since the launch of the Health Lottery, there has been an increase in sales of National Lottery tickets, which takes me back to the argument I used in my opening remarks: when you put another player into the market, the whole market benefits. The evidence is there for everyone to see and has been there in all these reports, including the Budd report and the scrutiny committee report. In the past 15 years, again and again we have had these reports and these consultations. The more the charity lottery market grows, the better it is for the National Lottery. They are not a threat; they help it.
It is late in the day and it is clear that my noble friend is not, for some extraordinary reason, minded to accept my amendments. I cannot imagine why. I suppose his department is keen to protect the National Lottery, which I understand even if I do not agree with it. However, I hope that the Government will look at the evidence, and will form their opinion on the evidence before them and not on what they would like it to be, which is what has gone on in the past. I note my noble friend’s use of the date of 4 March and we look forward to that, as well as to the secondary legislation that the Government are bringing forward. There is no reason not to do so. The Government have dawdled on this for far too long and it is far too important an area for that. I look forward to the Government stopping sitting on their hands and to their bringing forward some positive secondary legislation early in the new Parliament. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.