Orders of the Day — National Lottery Bill [Lords]

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 7:16 pm on 7 April 1998.

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Photo of Gareth Thomas Gareth Thomas Labour, Harrow West 7:16, 7 April 1998

Most of the organisations that responded represented a considerable number of individuals. I realise that it is difficult for Conservative Members to recognise the support that the New Opportunities Fund is receiving, but I urge them to join the mainstream on this issue at least.

More than half the 91 per cent. argued that the fund would act as a natural and obvious extension of the existing good causes, helping to deal with charges of imbalance and concern about the exclusion of health and education issues. In retrospect, it appears perverse that those issues were originally excluded. I do not think anyone has suggested that the first three initiatives announced by the Government under the auspices of the New Opportunities Fund will not be of considerable benefit to the country. Opposition Members have tried to argue that they somehow violate the additionality principle, but they clearly do not.

There is no doubt that the Government have considerable health, education and environment responsibilities, along with considerable arts, heritage and sport responsibilities. There is also no doubt that, within those areas, substantial areas of expenditure are core responsibilities of Government, to be publicly funded. But there will always be more that we would like to do, which the taxpayer cannot afford. That means desirable, as opposed to critical, expenditure, building on existing core expenditure. The three initial initiatives clearly fit into that category.

Healthy living centres have been variously described as the national lottery's first big idea, as long overdue and as a brilliant concept. I share that enthusiasm. Numerous reports have made it clear that there is a link between areas of deprivation and greater ill health, and it is nothing short of a scandal that the previous Government refused to acknowledge that link or to do anything about it.

Healthy living centres provide a powerful opportunity to improve the health of people of all ages, complementing existing services and reaching out to those who have been deprived of opportunities for better health. They will stimulate a range of additional services dealing with, for instance, stress management, healthy eating and drug and alcohol recovery, side by side with mainstream services and providing advice, self-help groups and opportunities for physical activity. Healthy living centres are an inspired choice for a share of the first tranche of money from the New Opportunities Fund, and I am not surprised that more than 96 per cent. of respondents supported them.

I especially welcome the commitment that, while there will be quality standards, there will be no central blueprint for projects. Healthy living centre schemes should come from within a community. They should be put together by those who will use the services—by the social entrepreneurs who exist in many communities, whose ideas have been ignored too often in the past by bureaucracies and professionals who believed that they knew best.

Healthy living centres must be high-class holistic partnerships, involving health professions and the local community, delivering services—perhaps with education and sporting bodies—in new and innovative ways. Their philosophy should encourage people to take responsibility for their personal physical and mental well-being.

There are already isolated examples of services that could provide models for healthy living centres. Later this month, the Peckham Pulse centre will open—an initiative bringing together the local community, some health services and some sporting facilities in a single high-quality modern centre. New sporting facilities will be "moulded in" with high-quality consulting rooms, a cafe, a fully staffed children's play area and meeting rooms for the local community.

The centre will bring together sport and health in a way that will not be off-putting, catering for those who—like many of us present tonight—may not yet be high-class performance athletes, and delivering improvements in the health of all people, whatever their capacity, and however fit they are.

I pay tribute to all those involved in the Bromley-by-Bow centre in Tower Hamlets, which I was privileged to visit recently. Creative arts projects and football teams stand side by side with community care projects and a community cafe. They are fully integrated with a health care centre and numerous religious organisations, not to mention an environmental project that is transforming the previously dilapidated local park. It is run by the community, pulling together statutory and non-statutory services. It was provided because the community wanted those services, and it is transforming the expectations of young and old alike.

The funding for out-of-hours schools-based activity is also welcome, as some of my hon. Friends have said. In my constituency, only a few schools have been able to establish some effective after-school provision so far. Pinner Wood first and middle schools in the north and Welldon Park first and middle schools in the south provide excellent out-of-school clubs, offering a wide range of activities to diverse groups of pupils. The Pinner Wood club has been so successful that it now has a growing waiting list. Welldon Park's list is also growing, and I was delighted to attend its very successful end-of-term entertainment last week.

I emphasise, however, that those two clubs are isolated examples. Many other schools and parents look on enviously. After-school clubs offer an excellent opportunity to combine child care with further education and play opportunities, enhancing children's social, intellectual and emotional development. They, too, are highly desirable projects, complementary to the core education provision in schools. The start-up money from the New Opportunities Fund will help to spread the excellent practice that exists in clubs such as those in my constituency.

Another interesting and welcome aspect of the Bill is the establishment of the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts. One of the successes of the lottery to date has been the lottery sports fund's championing and funding of our own world-class performance athletes. We need a similar fund that can champion the talented in the creative, scientific and technological worlds. It is little short of a scandal that, partly because of the absence of such a fund, other countries have had to step in to develop into commercially successful projects the ideas, inventions and new products of our science community.