Olympic raids prompt cuts in sector's lottery programmes

By John Plummer, Third Sector, 20 August 2008

Quarriers: a previous beneficiary of the Young People's Fund

The Big Lottery Fund has made further revisions to the amount of money it will award to the voluntary sector in the coming year.

The fund announced last week that it had reduced the value of the Young People's Fund 2 from £76m to £68m and the Research Programme, which awards grants for social and medical research, from £25m to £20m.

The combined £13m reduction follows the government's £638m raids on lottery funds last year to help pay for the rising costs of the 2012 Olympics, and comes despite vigorous campaigning by the voluntary sector to prevent further losses.

In June last year, Third Sector reported that the BLF was going to delay the opening of these same two programmes in anticipation of the Olympic cash transfer (13 June 2007, page 2).

A fund spokesman said current budgets had been revised because of difficulties with forward planning, over-subscription of programmes, fluctuations in lottery income and having to "factor the loss to our income as a result of the Olympics".

Sir Clive Booth, chair of the fund, said: "We recognise the concern this measure will cause, but following a review of grant budgets it is a necessary and pragmatic step to safeguard the grants already made and to protect future funding for the sector."

Greg Clark, shadow charities minister, said: "The sector has been let down. It was given assurances that it would not lose out again, but it has.

"There are four years to go to the Olympics and we can have no confidence that there won't be any further raids."

Don Foster, Liberal Democrat spokesman for culture, media and sport, said: "These funding cuts are an unfortunate consequence of the Government's repeated raids on lottery funds."

Belinda Pratten, senior policy officer at umbrella body the NCVO, said: "We would like to know the reason for this cut. If it is a result of money being transferred from the BLF to the Olympics, it would seem to go against the Government's commitment to protect resources for the voluntary and community sector."

The BLF spokesman said it would not elaborate further on its reasons.

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