In brief

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Camelot fine
The lottery regulator (NLC) has fined Camelot £5,000 for failing to provide a telephone subscription service for buying lottery tickets. Camelot had agreed to set up a phone-payment service after the NLC had received a complaint in 2001 from two house-bound blind people about not being able to pay for their tickets by phone.
Camelot had agreed to rectify the situation by December 2002, but failed to do so, hence the fine. A debit-card telephone payment service should now be up and running, aimed at disabled or house-bound customers.

CF letter
Richard Buxton, Community Fund chief executive, has written to all current grant-holders about the proposed merger, to reassure them that the fund is not about to be abolished.

In his letter of 24 April, he says: ‘As a current grant holder, your position will not be affected in any way should the new distributor come into operation, since the new distributor will meet all the existing grant commitments of the Community Fund. In addition, it is anticipated that the Community Fund will continue to make grants in its present form for a further period of at least two years.’ The letter comes in the wake of another burst of hostile media coverage, this time highlighting the CF’s announcement of its latest round of international awards. 

Wales conference
The Arts Council of Wales is holding its first annual conference, ‘Arts at the Heart’, on 19 and 20 May in Swansea. Registration closes on 14 May, so you’ll need to act quickly! You can register online at: https://secure.bucks.net/ gmp/artswales/startreg.asp

DCMS redesign
As part of a redesign of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport website, the location of the lottery awards database search has changed to: www.lottery.culture.gov.uk/ search.asp. The DCMS lottery home page is at: www.culture.gov.uk/national_lottery/default.htm

NOF landmark
The New Opportunities Fund has reached the £2bn landmark in its grant-making this month. The lottery’s first-among-equals distributor did not start work until 1998 but has concentrated on giving out large strategic grants, and since 2001 has also taken the Millennium Fund’s share of cash, leaving it in charge of one-third of all funding.