Orders of the Day — National Lottery Bill [Lords]

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 4:27 pm on 7 April 1998.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Francis Maude Francis Maude Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport 4:27, 7 April 1998

We have been given an absolute commitment that every order will be fully debated, either in Committee or on the Floor of the House. That is encouraging. I see that the Opposition Whip, my hon. Friend the Member for West Derbyshire (Mr. McLoughlin), is making a careful note of that. We shall look forward to debating the orders at considerable length.

The next clause that raises concern is clause 11. It is a nice clause: it is about strategic plans for distributors. When the Government spokesman on culture, media and sport in the House of Lords introduced the Bill on Second Reading, he was kindly patronising about this provision. He said:

This has been sadly lacking in the past and I know that the distributors welcome the new approach. But I should stress that these plans will belong to the distributors."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 December 1997; Vol. 584, c.735.] Many distributors want to have strategic plans, but what prevents them from having such plans at the moment? Nothing. There is only one possible explanation for this provision: it is to enable the Government to exercise more direct control over what the distributors do. It is the direct arrogation of power to ministerial offices that makes us concerned about clause 8. Under clause 11, what do the distributors have to do with the strategic plans? They have to prepare a draft and send a copy to the Secretary of State.