London 2012

The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games are well underway as I write this lottery blog entry, and I am getting more caught up in the event than I thought I would. So much so that I can’t wait for London 2012 to bring the action to the UK.

As a seasoned lottery player, I have no real problem with a proportion of my lottery spend being used to make the London 2012 Olympic Games as good as they can be. Yes, I moaned quite a bit on my Lottery Olympics piece when the people in charge spent £400,000 on the 2012 Olympic logo, but in principle I have no objection to a sensible proportion of Good Cause money helping to make London 2012 a success.

I wonder if I’m not the only person who is thinking like this as Beijing 2008 unfolds live on our television screens? The opening ceremony in Beijing was impressive, with or without the computer generated special effects that we now know were employed, and the games themselves seem to be going as smoothly as we could have hoped. If London 2012 can come close to what we have seen in Beijing so far, the UK will have a lot to be proud of.

The National Lottery has made a commitment to raise £750 million for the London 2012 Olympic Games and a large proportion of this will come from the Good Cause element in specifically designated games. This means that all we have to do to contribute to the Olympics is play one of those designated games from time to time, and instead of a percentage of our spend going to the Good Cause fund, it will automatically go to the Olympic Lottery Distribution Fund (known as the OLDF).

British athletes have already won a few gold medals in Beijing, and I wish them the very best of luck in their quest to win several more. But no matter what happens at Beijing 2008, lottery players all over the UK can do their bit to make London 2012 an equally impressive event. All we have to do is play a designated game or two.

Article Last Updated: 18/03/2009 18:13:12

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