Enquiry Over Lottery Funding

18th June 2009 1:31 PM

The Sport Council England has announced this week that it is launching an enquiry over lottery funding. The £19.3 million of funding from the UK National Lottery was allegedly paid from an account called the World Class Payments Bureau to individuals and organisations at the request of small governing bodies, but the money has not passed through their accounts or been audited correctly leading to this enquiry being launched.

Usually Sport England funding provides funds directly to governing bodies but it seems that procedure has not been followed leading to an enquiry over lottery funding.

	UK National Lottery (UK)
	UK National Lottery (Outside UK)

The discrepancy came to light this week and Jennie Price, the Sport England chief executive has now launched an independent inquiry into the National Lottery funding to be headed by Tim Dutton QC.

The inquiry with focus on how the lottery account worked and why it was not properly audited, the problems of course mean that the money from the bank account may have been misused and no doubt if there are problems then the audit will be looking at ways to recover any monies.

No doubt the National Lottery will be keen to distance themselves from this embarrassing situation as it raises huge questions about why the Sport England Fund was allowed to operate for eight years. The fund ran from 1999 to 2007 and both the foreman and chair of the fund will now be called forward to answer questions about the discrepancy and the issues surrounding what appears to be gross mismanagement.
 

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