Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Culture, Media and Sport – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 27 March 2000.
Mr Chris Smith
Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media & Sport, The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
12:00,
27 March 2000
No, the hon. Gentleman is wrong. For a start, the money is not in the hands of the Government. Secondly, although there is £3.5 billion in the national lottery distribution fund, 94 per cent. of that—more than £3 billion—has been committed by the distributing bodies to particular applications. If the hon. Gentleman thinks—as he seems to—that all normal public accountancy rules should be jettisoned and that, when a project is approved, the entire sum should immediately be given to the project rather being properly fed out as the project is built or developed, I suspect that his right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr. Davis), the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, might have a thing or two to say to him.