Good Causes could suffer if People’s Lottery misses targets

Good Causes could be tapped to pay fines incurred by The People’s Lottery should it fail to meet deadlines when installing terminals or prove incapable of making the next Lottery licence run on time, according to the game’s regulator.

The National Lottery Commission is considering bids to run the next Lottery licence from Camelot and Sir Richard Branson’s The People’s Lottery.

The winning operator could face fines of up to £4.8m for each day it misses the deadline to start the operation, once the licence begins running, either next year or early in 2002, and penalties of more than £9m for every 1,000 terminals it fails to install below the target.

A spokesman for the NLC says: “It is one of the issues you have with a not-for-profit lottery. It may be a fine would have to come from the costs and therefore affect the Good Causes But it depends what you fine them for.”

Camelot would pay any fines out of its profits and The People’s Lottery says it would normally pass the fines on to suppliers responsible for any lapses.

A spokesman for The People’s Lottery says: “I cannot envisage a situation in which we would not have recompense from our suppliers.”