Society lotteries raise over £300m for charities and good causes in record year

29 Nov 2019 News

Society lotteries raised £332m for good causes last year, according to recently published figures by the Gambling Commission.

This was an increase of 11 per cent or £32.95m on the previous year. The Gambling Commission recently published statistics relating to the period between April 2018 and March 2019, which also show that the amount raised by the National Lottery for good causes was £1.5bn, a drop of 1.5 per cent.

However sales of National Lottery tickets increased. This was down to different types of National Lottery games allocating different percentages of the ticket price to good causes. 

The Lotteries Council is made up over 400 charity lottery organisations across Great Britain, and says its has been encouraging the UK government to increase the “outdated” fundraising limits which charity lotteries operate under, in order to “further reduce administration costs and excess bureaucracy, and raise even more for good causes”.

'Given the tight charity fundraising climate - this growth in income is very welcome'

Tony Vick, Lotteries Council chair, praised players of charity lotteries for helping to raise a record amount and said that the growth in sales of both charity lotteries and the National Lottery showed that the two types of lottery are growing together.

Mr Vick said: “This has been a great year of charity fundraising by charity lotteries, with charities across the country benefiting as a result. Our thanks goes to charity lottery players across Britain who have helped the sector make a record amount for good causes.

“The charity lottery sector has a huge amount of fundraising talent within it – both staff and volunteers – and charities such as hospices, air ambulances, community groups and sports teams benefit as a result. Given the tight charity fundraising climate, this growth in income is very welcome.

“We also welcome that both charity lottery funding and National Lottery sales are on a growth trajectory, which makes clear that both types of lottery are growing together.

“The Lotteries Council are calling on the UK government to bring forward changes in the law to help charity lotteries to grow their funding to good causes, and these latest statistics further strengthen the case for those changes.”

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