In the UK, the coalition government is taking heat over its inability to deliver on any of its ‘big society’ promises, at least, not in a timely fashion. While most of the public’s focus is on the lack of progress on welfare reform and children’s education, what caught our eye is the delay in ‘plans to release unclaimed winnings from dormant betting accounts.’ The plan, spearheaded by Liberal Democrat Don Foster, would see government ‘release’ (you know, like ‘set free’) the money in these accounts and use it to fund children’s sports projects.
Foster has turned in a report to betting minister John Penrose, who has yet to act on any of the report’s contents. Allegedly, there’s been some resistance from bookmakers who may not fancy the gov’t snooping through its books looking for dead, er, ‘dormant’ people. Seriously, with the UK’s financial cupboard looking like Old Mother Hubbard’s, there might be extra pressure for civil servants to declare an account dormant. Imagine the ‘bring out your dead’ scene in Monty Python & The Holy Grail thus:
“I’m not quite dormant.”
“Shut up, you’ll be stone cold dormant in a moment.”
“I think I’ll have a flutter.”
“You’re not fooling anyone, you know.”