| 1 | 1 | | Saturday night. Hope and smoke fill the cramped TV room at a London hostel for |
| 2 | | the homeless as members of the lottery syndicate watch the prize draw. 'lt's a casual |
| 3 | | fantasy, a dream,' shrugs Trevor, 32. 'I've put in a pound. l don't actually expect to win |
| 4 | | anything, but there's no law against dreaming.' |
| 2 | 5 | | Camelot, the National Lottery operator, announced profits of flO.8 million last |
| 6 | | week. At the same time, the Govemment announced it was considering research into |
| 7 | | whether the game is encouraging an 'obsessive gambling culture'. |
| 3 | 8 | | Chris Andrews, 38, treasurer of another lottery syndicate with homeless members, |
| 9 | | laughs off the suggestion that he is addicted. Mr Andrews was discharged from the Army |
| 10 | | after 12 years, suffering from a rare disease. Now he lives on f86 a week disability benefit, |
| 11 | | of which he blows as much as flO on the lottery. |
| 4 | 12 | | I'm playing the lottery to get into the habit of saving,' he says, to a chorus of |
| 13 | | disbelief. 'Eventually I'm going to get out of here and get my own council flat. l want to get |
| 14 | | into the habit of putting flO a week away.' |
| 5 | 15 | | So far, Mr Andrews has lost far more than he has won - the syndicate's biggest |
| 16 | | jackpot, fl,429, left him with fl 75 after the rest had taken their cut - but he still denies |
| 17 | | suggestions that the lottery is a tax on the poor. |
| 6 | 18 | | The hostel's residents think the lottery is an 'excellent idea' and object to the notion |
| 19 | | of 'do-gooders' interfering with their dreams. 'It's a matter of personal choice,' says Trevor. |
| 7 | 20 | | --Most of the residents say they never gamble, apart from a regular small bet on the |
| 21 | | lottery. They are not alone: according to a survey last week by market analysts Mintel, the |
| 22 | | lottery has created a new breed of gamblers. Since it started, there has been a 15 per cent |
| 23 | | rise in the proportion of adults gambling and 71 per cent of the population now |
| 24 | | participates. Evidence from other countries with nationallotteries shows that people in |
| 25 | | lower income groups are by far the most likely to buy tickets. |
| 26 | | But the lottery syndrome is not just affecting the players. Lottery fever has already |
| 27 | | led to a wave of copy-cat schemes - Channel4's Big Breakfast ran aversion called 'Not a |
| 28 | | Lottery' for a while, and Children's lTV has featured 'Loopy Lottery' on its Saturday |
| 29 | | moming show, What's Up Doc?, in which children won personal computers and mountain |
| 30 | | bikes. |
| 8 | 31 | | 'Children are being introduced to the principles of gambling,' says Dr Mark |
| 32 | | Griffiths, a psychoiogist at the University of Plymouth who has studied gambling. Tm |
| 33 | | concemed about vulnerable members of society, including the young, being targeted by |
| 34 | | competition organisers. Youngsters buy scratch cards very easily.' |
| 9 | 35 | | Dr lan Brown, of Glasgow University, who specialises in the study of gambling, says: |
| 36 | | 'The lottery was always considered non-addictive because it was thought the action was |
| 37 | | too slow for the commoner kind of gambler. We thought people wouldn't get fired up |
| 38 | | because once a week was too long to wait.' |
| 10 | 39 | | But he adds th at research in the US has shown that, for between 5 and 10 per cent of |
| 40 | | gamblers seeking help, lotteries can become compulsive: 'Dreams and thoughts of winning |
| 41 | | the lottery can fill the whole week. Concentration on systems and winning combinations of |
| 42 | | numbers can take over people's lives.' |
| 11 | 43 | | Anecdotal evidence shows that scratch cards are even more likely to become |
| 44 | | addictive. Newsagents report that people who win back their fl often use the prize to buy |
| 45 | | another card straight away. 'The shorter the interval between the pay-out and the reward, |
| 46 | | the more addictive the gamble becomes,' said Dr Griffiths. |
| 12 | 47 | | 'The lottery is already a national institution. The Govemment has created the image |
| 48 | | that the lottery and gambling is a good thing because they are linked to charitable causes. |
| 49 | | But before the launch of the lottery the Govemment's line on gambling was that it was |
| 50 | | unacceptable.' |
