Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 4:27 pm on 7 April 1998.
It appears that there is now no agreement. I do not know why Labour had to make such a fuss about the profit element before the election, given that it has now utterly resiled from its former position. What we want is a system and an operator that will maximise the proceeds for good causes: that is what the lottery is for, for heaven's sake, and that is what the Act provides for. It is not a particularly revolutionary process. It is in the Act already, and the Secretary of State should now apologise for having run that canard so vigorously for so long.
The Secretary of State spoke at length about additionality. I appreciate that additionality is not a subject of discussion in pubs and clubs up and down the land, but people know what is straightforward and what is not, and the introduction of the lottery was always going to be controversial. As well as concern about the endorsement of gambling, there was bound to be anxiety about how the proceeds would be used. It was possible, however, to win widespread support for the lottery, and essential to that support were its two founding principles.
No one was more enthusiastic about those principles than the Labour party in opposition. Labour Members supported the lottery; indeed, they pressed us further, tabling amendments to entrench the system and make it more difficult for Ministers to abuse lottery money.
The principles were clear. First, lottery proceeds should not be used to fund projects that were mainstream Government responsibilities: that is the additionality principle. Secondly, the recipient projects should be chosen not by Ministers, but by distributing bodies operating independently of Ministers. That is the arm's-length principle. It is richly ironic that those twin principles, so passionately espoused by Labour in opposition, should now be so cynically betrayed by Labour in government.
No one contends that we could never contemplate the addition of further good causes to those already established; that would be absurd. But Labour warned us when in opposition that it was the ambition of every Finance Minister throughout the world to deploy lottery proceeds on mainstream Government policies.
What is so obnoxious about the Bill is the combination of theft and deceit. If the Government have got themselves into a tangle through policy commitments that they cannot fund in the usual way, let them be brave enough, and honest enough, to say so. Let them admit that they over-promised, and that they need to make up the shortfall from elsewhere.