There could be few more appropriate nights to bring up this motion than tonight because the prize fund for the National Lottery tonight is £2 million. Before one goes out to buy their card — it is now too late — this constitutes only the top prize. Although there are numerous other prizes as well, the top prize will entice many punters to buy the cards. The whole prize fund for charitable lotteries is limited to £10,000. This means that the best one can have for a top prize is approximately £6,000-£7,000. No matter how altruistic people are about supporting charities, they are bound to be swayed by the huge prizes offered by the national lottery.
The charitable lotteries constitute an important method of fund-raising in the voluntary sector. In the report, Charitable Giving and Volunteering in the Republic of Ireland, published in 1991 by the National College of Industrial Relations, the charity lottery ticket was one of the six most popular means of fund raising for the voluntary sector. The same report states that public donations to charities are approximately £250 million per annum. Of this amount, 6.5 per cent, or £16 million, is raised by charitable lotteries.
The important role of charitable lotteries has always been recognised by Government. Conscious that the voluntary sector relied on this form of fund raising for decades, the Government increased the prize fund for charitable lotteries before the launch of the national lottery in 1987 so as to enable the charitable lotteries to compete with the new national lottery. Prior to 1987 the Gaming and Lotteries Act, 1956, imposed a limit of £500 on the weekly prizes. However, in 1987 the then Minister for Justice, Deputy Dukes, increased the limit to £10,000 by statutory instrument. The Minister was empowered to do so under section 33 of the National Lottery Act, 1986.
In 1986 the then Taoiseach, Deputy Garret FitzGerald, gave two commitments to charities when the national lottery was instituted. First, he stated that the national lottery would not affect the general fund raising activities of other charities and, secondly, that charities which were fund raising by means of lotteries would be allowed to compete with the national lottery. Neither of these commitments has been honoured.
It is estimated that £20 million to £25 million of the £252 million spent by the public on the national lottery in 1992 was at the expense of charities. These charities have been unable to compete on an equal basis with the national lottery, which now accounts for 94 per cent of the Irish lottery business, because of the restriction on prize funds in charitable lotteries to £10,000 per week. Charities have not been major beneficiaries from the national lottery. In 1992 the annual report of the national lottery stated that the total cumulative grants to voluntary bodies in the social welfare area was just over £8 million for the period 1987-92. This figure represents 2.4 per cent of the national lottery's surplus during the same period, or £350 per charity of the 4,000 charities in the voluntary sector in Ireland.
When the national lottery was launched in 1987, it was evident that it was having a negative impact on the voluntary sector. Six years have passed since then and the matter has now reached crisis proportions. Some 16 of Ireland's leading charities who depended on lotteries as a means of fund raising made a submission to the then Taoiseach in June 1991 to increase the prize fund. These charities included the Alzheimers Society of Ireland, the Central Remedial Clinic, The Cheshire Foundation in Ireland, Clashganna Mills, Galway Association for Mentally Handicapped Children, the Mater Foundation, Multiple Sclerosis Care Foundation, The Multiple Sclerosis Society of Ireland, Cerebral Palsy Ireland, Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children Research, The Polio Fellowship of Ireland, the Rehabilitation Institute, St. Michael's House, St. Patrick's Hospital in Cork, St. Vincent's Hospital Educational Trust, and Special Olympics Ireland.
While the charitable lotteries would like to see the prize fund based on a percentage of the lottery income rather than on a finite sum, in the long term they would like the Minister for Justice, Deputy Geoghegan-Quinn, to increase the prize fund limit from £10,000 to £250,000 in the interim. This could be done immediately by statutory order, as the Minister knows. This would allow the charitable lotteries to give other large prizes as well as a top prize of £100,000.
It is worth making the point that the British Government increased the top prize money in their charitable lotteries from £12,500 to £100,000 when drafting their new national lottery legislation. The British Government made this decision after studying the negative effect which the national lottery in Ireland had on our charities.
There is no need for me to remind the Minister that if the voluntary sector did not exist, the funding for the services would have to be provided by the Exchequer. Consequently, direct support from the public to these charities is a substitute for Exchequer funding in the same way as the national lottery supports art, culture, the health services and so on.
This is an important problem and the Irish charitable lotteries, which have only a small share of the lottery in Ireland — it is only 6 per cent — should be helped immediately so that its existing share is not further eroded. Otherwise, its fund raising money will be negligible. This would be a great Christmas present for the charities. I ask the Minister to give it favourable consideration.
I forgot to ask if I could share my time with Senator Belton?
