Lottery Money for Local Sports

5.27.37pm UTC (GMT +0000) Wed 23rd Jul 2003

Vincent Cable MP with Whitton School Students

Two local organisations have recently received sports lottery grants. Whitton School has been given £110,000 by the New Opportunities Fund for a new dance and exercise studio designed to enhance the sports facilities for Whitton School and its feeder primary schools, and the local community.

St. Mary's College has been awarded, in principle, a grant to develop as the English Institute for Sport but has been warned that Sports England lottery grants are being curtailed and strictly capped as part of a restructuring and budget tightening operation.

MP Vincent Cable said: "I am naturally delighted that local institutions are attracting funding and especially Whitton School. But there is growing competition for lottery money and less of it."

"That is one reason why I am strenuously opposed to the funding arrangements for the London Olympics since there is a danger that lottery money will be siphoned off at the expense of local good causes - like Hampton Pool".