Lotteries Council call for Government to ‘future-proof’ Society Lottery limits

The Lotteries Council has called on Civil Society Minister, Tracey Crouch MP, to “future-proof” new fundraising limits governing society lotteries as it published its response to the Government’s consultation on updating the law relating to society lotteries.

With the limits last changed a decade ago and the current review progress having lasted around five years, the Council said that new fundraising limits should be set at a level which would work for the decade ahead, instead of needing to be changed again in a few years’ time.

On this basis the Council back a new £100 million annual sales limit, a £10 million per draw sales limit and a £1 million top prize regardless of sales.

The Council also backs changes to reduce the regulatory burden on small society lotteries by raising the sales thresholds for those lotteries to £40,000 per draw and £500,000 per year

Lotteries Council Chair, Tony Vick, told Charity Today:

“It has been around a decade since the last changes to the law on society lotteries. In that period the society lottery sector had seen strong growth, raising hundreds of millions for good causes across the country. It is a real fundraising success story.

“However the process of reviewing the law has taken a very long time, and over that period the current limits have increased the bureaucracy of fundraising this way for many of our member organisations. Change is well overdue but we need the new limits to work for the foreseeable future.”

Chair of the Lotteries Council Public Affairs Committee, Malcolm Fleming, added:

“Good legislation is that which stands the test of time and we do not want to be in the position of having to ask Government to raise these limits again in a year or two. That is why The Lotteries Council urges the Minister, Tracey Crouch MP, to ‘future proof’ the limits, by setting them at a level which doesn’t just work for 2018, but which will still work over the years ahead.

“The Lotteries Council believes that an annual sales limit of £100 million, a per draw sales limit of £10 million and a maximum prize of £1 million, can stand the test of time and are also not over burdensome to lottery operators, one of the key objectives the Government set out when it published its consultation.”

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