European Lotteries Take Their €29.4bn to Brussels as a Democracy Argument

A roundtable on the International Day of Democracy concluded that protecting the "European lottery model" is a matter of civil society, not sectoral interest. The figure is from March; the framing is new, and it is aimed at the institutions that decide what the model is allowed to be.

• Seven organisations met in Brussels on 15 September, the International Day of Democracy, for a roundtable on the contribution of national lotteries to civil society and European democracy, according to a statement from The European Lotteries (EL)
• The roundtable concluded that "recognising and protecting the European lottery model is therefore not simply a sectoral interest" but a way of safeguarding funding for civil society and communities
• EL cites the record €29.4 billion its members returned to society in 2024, a figure first published in its sector report in March, on €46.1 billion of GGR
• Participants included the European Movement International, ALDA, ECAS, the Centre for European Volunteering, the European Disability Forum and the Association of Charity Lotteries in Europe, alongside EL
• The statement invokes the 1985 Adonnino Committee's proposal for a Europe-wide lottery, Herman Van Rompuy's 2025 remarks and a 2024 speech by Court of Justice president Koen Lenaerts describing lotteries as part of Europe's "social fabric"

An Association Reframes Its Annual Number

The European Lotteries (EL), the association of state-licensed lottery operators, said on Tuesday that a roundtable held in Brussels on the International Day of Democracy had brought together seven organisations to discuss the contribution of national lotteries to civil society and European democracy. The discussion formed part of the Democracy Forward Inspirational Festival, organised by the Belgian National Lottery Fund for Democracy and managed by the King Baudouin Foundation, according to EL's statement.

The central conclusion, as EL reports it, was that democracy "is not only about voting" but about connecting people and building communities, that strong democracies depend on "a vibrant and independent civil society", and that at a time of "growing social fragmentation, pressure on resources and, in places, a narrowing civic space", stable support for that civil society has rarely mattered more. National lotteries, the statement says, have long supplied it: by returning proceeds to society, "including a record €29.4 billion in 2024", they fund sport, culture, heritage and social initiatives and give organisations "stable, non-commercial funding that supports their independence".

The €29.4 billion is not new. It comes from the 19th edition of EL's Report on the Lottery Sector in Europe, published on 25 March 2026 and covered here in August: 67 member lotteries in 37 countries generated €109.9 billion in sales and €46.1 billion in GGR in 2024, returning more than 62% of GGR to public purposes, against €22 billion returned in each of 2022 and 2023. What Tuesday added is a political frame. The statement reaches back to the Adonnino Committee's 1985 "People's Europe" reports, which proposed a Europe-wide lottery for arts and culture; to Herman Van Rompuy's remark at the 2025 EL Congress that the role of lotteries "deserves, more than ever, special recognition in the Union"; and to Koen Lenaerts, president of the Court of Justice of the EU, who in 2024 described lotteries as part of Europe's cultural heritage that "play a role in shaping the European social fabric" while stressing the need to protect players and social order.

"Strong democracies require strong communities," said EL secretary general Piet Van Baeveghem. "National lotteries help support the social fabric that makes those communities possible." The roundtable concluded that "recognising and protecting the European lottery model is therefore not simply a sectoral interest", and participants agreed on "the value of reinforcing these shared messages collectively". The participating organisations were the European Movement International, ALDA, ECAS, the Centre for European Volunteering, the European Disability Forum, the Association of Charity Lotteries in Europe and EL itself.

"Protecting the Model" Is a Legal Position Dressed as a Civic One

The European lottery model means national monopolies or exclusive licences, justified under EU law by public-interest objectives rather than by the internal market. That justification has to be re-argued every time a commercial operator challenges a monopoly, every time the Commission weighs action against a member state over cross-border enforcement, and every time a court is asked whether a state lottery's exclusivity is proportionate. Quoting the president of the Court of Justice on lotteries and "social order" in a democracy-day statement is not incidental. It is the association placing its strongest legal authority inside its warmest civic argument, so that the next proportionality case is heard by judges who have read that lotteries are part of the social fabric.

The Number Is Doing Two Jobs, and Only One of Them Is Charity

More than 62% of GGR returned to society is a genuine distinction from commercial gambling, and it is the reason state lotteries survive advertising restrictions and tax rises that are squeezing everyone else this week, from Entain's shops to Brightstar's balance sheet. It is also the figure that makes a monopoly politically defensible, and the roundtable's conclusion, that protecting the model is not a sectoral interest, is the sector saying so through six organisations that are not lotteries. Both readings are true. A reader should simply notice that the contribution figure includes what goes to state budgets as tax, 73% of the total in the 2022 edition of the report, which every operator pays in some form, and that the case for exclusivity rests on the rest.

The lotteries have a record number and have found a room in Brussels in which to say what it is for. The audience that matters is not civil society; it is the institutions that decide whether the model stays exclusive.