Osborne wants to raid the Lottery and rob food banks to pay for his spending cuts


He has tried raiding tax credits and Universal Credit; he has considered cutting Housing Benefit. Now it seems George Osborne is planning to take money from charities to pay for his spending cuts.

It seems he wants to cut government funding for the arts (again!) and top it up with cash taken from the National Lottery.

The Lottery money is earmarked for charities, so they will lose out.

Isn’t it interesting that, back in 2010, David Cameron was looking to charities for help in providing services that spending cuts meant the Coalition Government would not be able to provide, as part of his white elephant ‘Big Society’ project?

Now it seems he’ll be rubber-stamping Osborne’s plan to wreck any such substitute provision.

Oh, and if the Big Lottery Fund takes a massive hit, guess what will be among the biggest losers?

Food banks.

Whitehall leaks show the Chancellor wants to nick £320million from the Big Lottery fund in Wednesday’s spending review, the Sunday People reports.

The money is earmarked for good causes, but Mr Osborne could get his hands on it by slashing Government arts spending.

Lottery money would then be diverted to compensate the Arts Council and other bodies for losing taxpayer cash.

Sir Stuart Etherington of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations said: “It would be hugely damaging to the lottery if players saw it as financing a government slush fund to compensate for spending cuts.”

Source: Keep your hands off our Lottery fund, cash-strapped charities tell George Osborne – Mirror Online

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27 Comments

  1. NMac November 23, 2015 at 2:51 pm - Reply

    Wow! these people really are evil. Have they robbed their own Grandmothers yet, or are they next?

    • Paul Syson November 25, 2015 at 8:55 am - Reply

      Nah they sold their grandmothers in 2011

  2. Darren Woodiwiss November 23, 2015 at 2:52 pm - Reply

    Oh, doesn’t the government still owe the Lottery the £425 million for the Olympics?

    https://www.dsc.org.uk/big-lottery-refund/

  3. Joan Edington November 23, 2015 at 3:04 pm - Reply

    This is fairly old news, at least to us in Scotland. We were warned of our £30m share of these cuts over a week ago and, as usual (I expect), the money will be used to prop up English cuts. I can’t see Creative Scotland (the equivalent of the English Arts Council) getting their mitts on a penny.

    • Mike Sivier November 23, 2015 at 4:27 pm - Reply

      So I see – although I think the cuts will be UK-wide; this is his amelioration of the cuts he planned for tax credits, which is a UK scheme.
      It makes interesting reading: http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/14037759.SNP_demands_answers_over_possible___30_million_funding_cut_to_Big_Lottery_in_Scotland/

      • Joan Edington November 23, 2015 at 8:29 pm - Reply

        I was referring to the paragraph “Lottery money would then be diverted to compensate the Arts Council and other bodies for losing taxpayer cash.”

        This article specifically mentioned the arts and didn’t mention tax credit cuts. I’m not sure how cutting the Lottery funding would ameliorate anything since, as you pointed out, the food banks would be one of the victims.

        My point was only relevant if, as the article suggests, the money saved from the lottery is diverted to The Arts Council, an English-only body, while cutting a proportional amount from the Scottish share of the Lottery cash. I am looking at it in the same way as for other so-called UK Projects, where Scotland pays a proportional amount but gets no benefit, such as HS2 which they have made very clear they will never extend over the border.

        • Mike Sivier November 24, 2015 at 8:16 pm - Reply

          We’ll find out tomorrow, I suppose. Can’t say I’m looking forward to it, whatever Osborne says.

  4. mili68 November 23, 2015 at 3:10 pm - Reply

    Tweeted @melissacade68

  5. visualjaz November 23, 2015 at 3:39 pm - Reply

    If You’re Starting To ‘Raid The Lottery Fund’… Then You Really Have Got Your Sums Wrong…!!! Just Shows How Inept, Incompetent These CONMEN& WOMAN Really Are!!! CON By NAME, CON By NATURE, the CONservatives IN POLITICS TO LINE THEIR OWN POCKETS AT THE EXPENSE OF THE COUNTRY!!!!!!!!!

  6. mrmarcpc November 23, 2015 at 4:22 pm - Reply

    Anything to shaft us more and put in the poorhouses even quicker, they’ll do it, he is one of the worst chancellors ever, even worse than Brown!

  7. che November 23, 2015 at 4:40 pm - Reply

    no more lottery tickets for me then

  8. joanna may November 23, 2015 at 4:55 pm - Reply

    If working people are playing the lottery it is their decision and I think numbers will go down if the Cons are getting greedy hands on it, but I for one don’t play the lottery, I can’t afford to and there is also a moral issue for me, the £2 for the lottery is better used by buying 2 bags of 4 hot sausage rolls for when I pass a homeless person on the street. The lottery is gambling, that is not essentially what I get money for and I am very fortunate not to have a drug or alcohol problems my heart does however go out to those who do have those type of problems.

    But for the government to do what they are doing is beneath contempt!!!!

  9. Peter November 23, 2015 at 6:23 pm - Reply

    These conservatives are desperate for engagement in Syria, simply because their financial stewardship is in tatters and they can hide behind the war on Isis to mask there financial incompetence. As for the Lottery. if they take money out to pay taxes I will not buy any more – screw them.

  10. Frank November 23, 2015 at 10:35 pm - Reply

    320 mill would just about pay for osbournes coke habit!

  11. Mr.Angry November 24, 2015 at 6:15 am - Reply

    They are starting to fall apart, let them, yes we will suffer even more but they have destroyed this country beyond recognition and soon the whole country will rise up against them.

    I never in my life thought I would see Doctors going on strike, I thought Thatcher was evil this lot make her look like a pussy cat.

  12. chris November 24, 2015 at 9:10 am - Reply

    I can’t believe what I am reading; if the govement take money from the lottery fund it would be a disgrace to us all.

  13. Pension Sixty November 24, 2015 at 1:29 pm - Reply

    Foodbanks get money from the lottery fund? Didn’t know that.

  14. terry November 24, 2015 at 1:41 pm - Reply

    Same old crap rich getting richer poor getting poorer whens it going to stop NEVER while people sit back and allow it to happen .

  15. albert fishwick November 24, 2015 at 3:06 pm - Reply

    this is what you get appointing mates ahead of qualification to do the job,its all thru this government,Goves,Hunt,May.to name a few.

  16. David Bacon November 24, 2015 at 3:51 pm - Reply

    Now Cameron has his majority he and Osborne can do whatever they please. NMac, 23 November, asks if this crew have robbed their own grandmothers. I doubt if they have, but they sure are going after our grandmothers and anybody else who can’t fight back – which is most of us.

  17. bob court November 24, 2015 at 7:21 pm - Reply

    i’d say that the people who voted for the Conservative Party david cameron and George Osborne.. should pay the £320million. not take it from the Big Lottery fund and the food bank’s

  18. Willum November 24, 2015 at 8:00 pm - Reply

    If they didn’t send almost £225 million every week to every rag-tag and bobtail nation on the face of this earth then they would have enough money to take care of the tax payers of this country, which is where the money came from in the first place.

    • Mike Sivier November 24, 2015 at 8:21 pm - Reply

      That’s a completely different issue, to do with commercial colonialism. The money doesn’t go to foreign countries to use as they please. It goes to support the commercial interests of UK firms there – if I recall correctly.

  19. Darren Woodiwiss November 24, 2015 at 8:31 pm - Reply

    Most grants are conditional, I remember reading about an EU grant to an African country that was conditional on the opening up of the water utilities to European companies

    • Mike Sivier December 3, 2015 at 11:59 am - Reply

      This is to do with international development and explains why it’s a scam.

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