Sport England Imposes Winter Freeze

British sport is facing another financial squeeze after Sport England's new chairman last night imposed a three-month freeze on lottery funding to allow a period of "stock-taking" within the organisation.

Patrick Carter's decision effectively means the abolition of the lottery panel, which met yesterday for the 94th time since the lottery began eight years ago. From next April, awards will be discussed by nine regional Sport England boards. By then Carter hopes to have undertaken a strategic review of the kind of projects Sport England can fund at a time when fewer lottery tickets than ever are being sold.

In the past five years Sport England has seen the lottery money it allocates fall from a high of £268m in 1997-8 to a projected £170m for 2002-3. That figure may decline further.

While UK Sport handles about £23m of lottery funding for international competitors based on performance, Sport England deals largely with the funding of new facilities from grass-roots to elite levels, and the funding of governing bodies and talent identification.

Carter, a successful businessman who succeeded Trevor Brooking as chairman this month, hopes the move will conserve resources, maintain maximum financial flexibility and allow time for Sport England to assess future lottery income against itscommitments to existing and future programmes.

Projects already promised money will not be affected and neither, in the short term, should funding for the current crop of athletes. But the development of new talent could suffer, given anticipated falls in lottery money. Sport England has already warned organisations to look at ways of making savings.

"The stock-take will allow us time to align our future lottery income with our new and developing business strategy," said Carter. "It will put us in a stronger position for the future to support English sport."