NATIONAL lottery cash is being used to teach accountants to Salsa dance, the Manchester Evening News can reveal.
Almost é500,000 is being spent on bizarre schemes aimed at helping Greater Manchester companies get office staff fitter.
Cash has also gone to the Trafford-based arm of Kellogg's to employ an "activity co-ordinator" and give staff pedometers. The company is currently giving pedometers away with Special K.
At another accountancy firm lottery money paid for subsidised gym membership for staff and two "health information kiosks" in their offices.
Yoga lessons
Last week, the MEN revealed that thousands of pounds of lottery money was spent on funding yoga lessons for staff at Manchester United, a gym at ITV Granada for staff - including Coronation Street stars - and to fund gym membership for lawyers at Halliwells law firm.
The handouts sparked outrage, with Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell being challenged over them in Parliament.
Now government agency Sport England, which handed out the lottery cash, has revealed full details of the companies who have been granted funding.
Champion Accountancy, in Worsley, was given é35,744 to carry out health and lifestyle assessments and organise a range of healthy activities like free Salsa lessons, healthy walks and charity runs. A company spokesman said: "Like any other business we have some junior members of staff and this programme is geared towards them."
Pedometers
Another accountancy firm, Fairhurst, in Wigan, was awarded é40,955 to organise walking groups, to give pedometers to staff and buy bicycles for communal use.
A spokesman for Kellogg's, which was given é15,000, said: "Kellogg's has funded projects for its staff such as the Fit For Life initiative which encourages them to increase their activity levels. The funding contributes a percentage towards extending these types of initiatives."
The list also revealed that é6,000 was given to William Hulme Grammar School, a private school, to provide a gym for staff. A school spokesman said: "There was an open tender and we applied because we thought it would be great for staff."
Sports leagues
Among the other recipients were Bolton firm Integrated Dental Holdings, who got é6,000 to set up sports leagues throughout its departments; Contour Housing Group, in Salford, who won é7,650 to send staff sailing and orienteering and Bunzl Retail Suppliers, in Swinton, who were awarded é19,520 to get staff cycling.
A spokesman for Manchester United said the club had no intention of giving back its é30,000 grant. He said: "We have not reviewed our position."
When Ms Jowell defended the grants in Parliament she said: "The judgement of the lottery board is that the money is worth risking to get people more active."
SHOULD lottery money be spent on getting workers fitter? Have your say.
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Good causes, yes.
Seems this has now gone crazy.....I wouldnt class Kellogs, MUFC, fat cat Solicitors (150 quid an hour) and even fatter accountants good causes..but..the difference is, they know how to fill the forms in which, the average Joe wanting to do something struggles with sadly.
Yes, SOME of the money could be spent getting staff fitter but NOT GOT TO THOSE WHO CAN AFFORD IT like those stated in your story (Accountants, Lawyers) It should be given to us normal day to day staff to boost morale in the workplace not another benefit for the big wigs!
Why shouldn't these companies benefit from Lottery cash ? My own company has submitted an application for a grant to extend my homes swimming pool for use of company directors & executives who get little exercise sat behind desks & steering wheels for most of the working day. Why should I be the only one to benefit from this pool when a grant from Sport England will make it bigger for others to benefit. I've always believed a healthy body equates with a healthy mind which in turn will benefit my company with increased productivity & therefore benefits the country as a whole with the increased profits generated. The masses already have plenty of public parks to enable them to keep fit & exercise in, if they could only drag themselves from their armchairs where they sit most of the day & night drooling into their pie & chip wrappers whilst turning goggle eyed watching their soap star heroes & reality television peers. If you gave the masses access to gym equipment they would only wreck it like they do the children's play equipment, bowling greens & tennis courts already provided for them in public parks. People aspiring to better themselves through studying & hard work should be rewarded for their efforts & those content to fester in front of their television sets getting obese should have no complaints about the use of Lottery cash in this way.
Can't see anything wrong with it myself - the sedentary lifestyle endured by workers who sit on a train, then sit at a PC, then sit watching telly is a big danger to health. I know I'd like to take time out of my work day to get fitter!
Scrap the lottery and give it to richard branson,I cannot understand why he didnt get it in the first place .He said that he would give all the charities most of the money and all that he wanted was the advertising? What is wrong with that???
The Conservative Party have got a cheek complaining about these awards. By insisting on "match funding" when they set the lottery up, they pre-determined that the "rich" would always benefit more from the lottery than the poor!!
Anyway compared to the Royal Opera House, Wembley, the Tate and the billions due to be spent on the Olympics (in probably the richest city in the world) - this ??500 grand is utterly insignificant.
Do not waste your money on the lottery so they can not give your money away. So simple not worth talking about.
All the comments on this so far disgust me to be honest. If it is so stressful sitting behind a desk, working at a PC then get a different job. There are plenty of them about and I for one for never even dream of having the bare faced cheek to go to the national lottery to pay for me to go to the gym or yoga. I work in an area that is very deprived and I submit bids to all sorts of funding agencies such as the lottery to try and bring more facilities into the area because there is nothing here. Time and time again I and other community groups are knocked back, yet multi million pound companies get money for the health of their staff. The lottery s a disgrace and the companies that have got this money should be ashamed of themselves for taking money away from deprived areas
And still they can't seem to find any cash in the pot for Francis House/Kirsty's Appeal, you know the one that helps to save dying children!!! The Lottery have never given so much as ONE GROAT to this worthy cause.
DISGUSTING!
The whole lottery is a scam. People have got that way that they believe the only way they can ever get money is through the lottery instead of through their own work or wisdom and ideas. Giving lottery cash to firms like United and Kellogs is stupid, they can well afford to pay for all that themselves. I agree that they know how to fill the forms in and thats what happens. There are a lot of small groups out there in the community doing some good work with the young people etc who exist on peoples good will, they are the ones that should be getting the money. And when all said and done, Richard B should be running the lottery at the end of the day.
Why can't they buy their own gyym memberships when our Olympic team is unfudned. it really is disgraceful
What a joke! The panel who awarded these "good causes" are in serious need of replacing. The NHS is a good cause that everyone uses as some stage in their life.
I know I could withdraw from the office syndicate but the week I do..............
What a joke! The panel who awarded these "good causes" are in serious need of replacing. The NHS is a good cause that everyone uses as some stage in their life.
I know I could withdraw from the office syndicate but the week I do..............
So it is just another form of taxation.
Robin hood - us the wrong way round, stealing from the poor to give to the rich, well thats just class!
They can afford to pay for their lifstyles if they choose to.
So why give money thats supposed to help needy! (not the greedy!) causes to the least needy, I am not understanding something here?
I suppose it's just the case of who and what you know.
Well they arent having any more of my money, although I don't have much, I'll give my quid to charity!
And another thought, maybe Lottery it is not, change the name?
I don't see what harm it's doing personally, it's a means to an end. OK not all of these companies sound like the most deserving causes, that's one opinion. But think about it what is going to happen if we carry on allowing society to get more and more unfit, that's right, more load on the NHS, more load on the public purse. Prevention rather than cure - nothing wrong with that!
I want lottery cash to help teach me how to walk upright with a 4lb crown on my bonce....Also I need to learn how to thrash the plebs into submission...I don't want to kill the bumpkins as they need to keep playing the lottery- so that I can apply for foxtrot lessons for my horse(tiddles).
At last... lottery money going to the people that really need it, Man Utd (the second richest football club in the world), Accountants and last but not least actors from Coronation Street who would otherwise have to spend some of their half a million pound a year salary for a gym membership. These schools and hospitals are already rolling in cash so why give them anymore? Keep up the good work!!
Many of us do not really feel we want to fund the Olympics - if the Lottery Board decide to spend the money on activities which should under no circumstances be funded by the lottery then lets hope we will stop buying tickets.
If companies like Man Utd. want money then stop paying their players so much!! This is absolutely ridiculous - criminal in fact! As in the past activities like this should be funded by the companies themselves.
This should become a major scandal.
I believe that lottery money should only be spent on good causes, Not on accountants ECT
Who earn some of the largest
salerys in the UK.