Legislative Reform (Exempt Lotteries) Order 2016

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Monday 18th January 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Earl for his easily absorbed comments on the reasons for doing the LRO in this way. It was good to capture it in the way he did. I agree with the noble Lord who has just spoken that the benefits of using the LRO system also have spin-offs in terms of the clarity of the documentation, which again I commend to your Lordships. It is very good to have it. Of course, the Keeling schedule is a delight. Oh, for Keeling schedules for everything we did!

I have only a couple of questions about the wording of the document, which I am sure will not take the noble Earl long to respond to. The Explanatory Note says, with reference to Article 3:

“A work lottery or a residents’ lottery is now exempt in two circumstances, where the lottery … is promoted wholly for a purpose other than that of private gain”—

that is clear. Then there is a double negative which caught me up and perhaps the Minister could read into the record what it is meant to mean. It says that a lottery is now exempt if it,

“is not organised in such a way as to ensure that no profits are made”.

Is that the same as saying, “is organised in such a way as to ensure that it is not profit-making”? One gets caught by these things sometimes and I just wanted to be clear. I would be grateful if, once he has had the advice, he could clarify this.

The Explanatory Note makes a possibly interesting point about Article 4, which is that,

“the maximum imprisonment for an offence committed under section 261(1)(ba) is six months”,

but then goes on to say:

“When section 281(5) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 comes into force, this will increase to 51 weeks”.

Whatever happened to inflation? I know this is not the Minister’s department but does he have any idea when we are likely to see that change? Clearly, a change from 26 weeks to 51 weeks is quite a big one and, even then, given that this was 2003, perhaps it ought to be higher than that, given the way in which people are behaving. But I do not really want to hold up the Committee with that light-hearted point.

The noble Earl will recall that he responded to a debate in the Chamber about the National Lottery just before Christmas. A number of points were made in that debate, most importantly about the balance to be struck in public policy between the National Lottery, which is of course a monopoly aimed at making the maximum amount of funds available from the gambling intentions of the public to good causes as defined in the legislation, and the impact that is being made on the National Lottery, it is alleged, by a number of society lotteries that are now growing up across the country. The debate, which attracted contributions from all round the House, was broadly characterised by saying that there were growing but not yet serious concerns that the so-called society lotteries—there is one called the Health Lottery; and there is one that is a postcode lottery, which is organised in a slightly different way—are trying to wear the clothes of a national lottery because obviously it serves their purposes better if they can be seen to be competing with the National Lottery.

However, as the noble Earl will recall, the point about this is that the society lotteries have different rules applying to them in terms of where their proceeds may go—and I am not saying in any sense that they do not support good causes, but they are different from those specified in the National Lottery—yet they are benefiting from being seen as a sort of national lottery, to which perhaps those rules should apply. Secondly, the cost framework for the society lotteries is different from that of the National Lottery, which is specified in regulation and limits the extent to which the company operating the National Lottery on behalf of the good causes can charge costs and expenses, which of course does not apply to the society lotteries.

This is familiar territory for the noble Earl. I am sure he is well briefed to respond to it. His response to the comments from around the House in the previous debate was that there was to be a review, which would deal with a number of these points, building on some work done, I think, three years ago now, which seemed to suggest that the National Lottery was not being affected by society lotteries. The volume of responses that I have received—and I think other noble Lords have had the same correspondence since that debate—prompts me to ask whether or not there is any progress on the review of the National Lottery versus the society lotteries and, if there is any news on that, when we might expect to see some output from that review. These things are part of this overall package.

Having said that, we have no specific objection to what has been proposed. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, that this brings a number of people who are probably operating outside the law back into the law but does so in a way that I think will benefit good causes, and we have no objection to that.

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, I thank both noble Lords for their contributions to this short debate. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for his support of the order and his comments on the success of the Red Tape Challenge. He made a number of comments, in particular about what happened in the Chamber last week. Of course, he would not expect me to comment on that. One should also look at the responses given to the consultation by the various stakeholders, which answer one of the points that the noble Lord made. The Lotteries Council, Cancer Research UK, the British Red Cross, Sue Ryder and Marie Curie cancer care all consider that this will help to increase the amount of money raised for these very important and valuable charities.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, mentioned a number of matters and I will do my best to answer them all. As ever, if I do not answer them in enough detail I will write to him. He started by talking about a review of the performance of this order. We will take the noble Lord’s words into account and speak to the Gambling Commission on this issue. The noble Lord also mentioned the House of Commons Select Committee report on society lotteries, published in March 2015. He basically asked if the Government will adopt the recommendations set out in that report. The department is taking action on this. The committee said that the Government should seek advice from the Gambling Commission in relation to those recommendations. We have done so and await that advice. Any proposals will need to receive the approval of Ministers, which will happen in due course.

[The Earl of Courtown]

It is probably best if I write to the noble Lord and give him the exact details of what is planned. Obviously, as I said from this position, there are some points that we will take back to the Gambling Commission. Once I have checked with the department, I will write to the noble Lord with exact details of any review. I will ensure that the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, is also included in that.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I think we are slightly mixing up two issues here. The point made by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, was about this order and the effect it will have on those small lotteries and events run for residents. The question was whether there would be a review of that and I think the Minister will write to him about it. My point was about society lotteries and I did not refer to the House of Commons Select Committee. I could have done but chose not to because I wished to let the Minister know that the outcome of the debate we had in the House just before Christmas was a number of letters, including ones from those responsible for operating society lotteries. I wondered whether there was any progress there. I think the Minister was in the process of explaining that that is also being progressed.

[Lord Clement-Jones]

My Lords, that is precisely why I asked the question: there seems to have been a conflation of the two points.