Policy
Lived Experience Advisory Panel: Managing conflicts of interest policy
The policy on managing conflicts of interest for the Gambling Commission's Lived Experience Advisory Panel. The policy aims to maintain public trust and confidence.
Optimise returns to good causes from The National Lottery
Since 1994, the National Lottery has made a significant contribution to society through the funding it generates for good causes, including a wide variety of sports, arts, heritage and community-based projects. The total raised stands at over £48 billion, with more than 685,000 individual awards having been made.
Our key focus for 2023 to 2024 was to ensure a seamless and timely transition to the Fourth National Lottery Licence.
Our achievements
We ensured that Camelot, who held the Third National Lottery licence until 31 January 2024, continued to deliver it in a safe and socially responsible way. Returns to good causes derived from a combination of the Third and Fourth Licence period finished the financial year at £1.70 billion.
We also completed a wide range of work to support the closing down of the Third Licence period. This activity will conclude during the 2024 to 2025 financial year, once the last financial statements associated with the period are finalised.
We reported last year that substantive legal challenges remained following the Gambling Commission’s award of the National Lottery licence to Allwyn in February 2022. One substantial piece of litigation came to an end in January 2024, when the Court of Appeal granted the claimant’s request to discontinue its appeal against a High Court decision that it had no legal standing to pursue a case for damages against the Commission. However, two challenges remain.
On 1 February 2024, Allwyn was formally granted the licence to operate the National Lottery. To enable this a huge volume of legal and regulatory work was completed, including ensuring that all trust mechanisms were fully established and operational with approximately £500 million successfully transferred between Third and Fourth Licence trusts during cutover. The Licence was transitioned smoothly with no noticeable impact on users.
Subject to resolution of the legal challenges the licence will run for 10 years, and Allwyn expects its investment to deliver growth and innovation across the National Lottery’s products and channels, resulting in increased contributions to good causes whilst maintaining the protection of participants and propriety.
Building on our experience to date, the Fourth Licence incorporated some key changes, including: a new ‘Incentive Mechanism’ that means all National Lottery products will now make Returns to Good Causes at the same level. It also means that Allwyn will only see profits rise if Returns to Good Causes increase.
This also includes a move to an outcomes-based approach, in line with best practice. This will give the licensee greater responsibility to fulfil its obligations, while retaining the Commission’s powers to intervene if they fail to do so.
In readiness for 1 February 2024, we recruited and established the team responsible for regulation under the Fourth Licence period. Over the coming year, we will continue to embed our revised regulatory approach, team structure, and implement our frameworks and processes to enable us to continue to regulate the National Lottery licensee efficiently and effectively.
Last updated: 17 October 2024
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