The National Lottery
The National Lottery logo (since 2015)
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| Region | |
|---|---|
| First draw | 19 November 1994 |
| Operator | Camelot Group |
| Regulated By | National Lottery Commission |
| Highest Jackpot | £161,653,000 |
| Odds of winning jackpot |
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| Number of Games | 6 |
| Shown on |
BBC One (1994–2016) BBC iPlayer (2017–) |
| Website | www |
The National Lottery is the state-franchised national lottery in the United Kingdom.
It is operated by Camelot Group, to whom the licence was granted in 1994, 2001 and again in 2007. The lottery is regulated by the National Lottery Commission, and was established by the government of John Major in 1994.
All prizes are paid as a lump sum and are tax-free. Of all money spent on National Lottery games, 50% goes to the prize fund, 28% to "good causes" as set out by Parliament (though some of this is considered by some to be a form of "stealth tax" levied to support the Big Lottery Fund, a fund constituted to support public spending), 12% to the UK Government as duty, 5% to retailers as commission, and a total of 5% to operator Camelot, with 4.5% to cover operating costs and 0.5% as profit. Lottery tickets and scratch cards (introduced in 1995) may be bought only by people of at least 16 years of age.
A statute of 1698 provided that in England lotteries were by default illegal unless specifically authorised by statute. Early English state lotteries included the Million Lottery (1694) and the Malt Lottery (1697). These Lotteries were part of a series of financial experiments by the English government including recoinage and the foundation of the Bank of England to raise the capital available to the state.
A 1934 Act, further liberalised in 1956 and 1976, legalised small lotteries. The UK's state-franchised lottery was set up under government licence by the government of John Major in 1993. The National Lottery is franchised to a private operator; the Camelot Group was awarded the franchise on 25 May 1994. The first draw took place on 19 November 1994 with a television programme presented by Noel Edmonds. The first numbers drawn were 30, 3, 5, 44, 14 and 22, the bonus was 10, and seven jackpot winners shared a prize of £5,874,778.
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