Lottery to fund World Cup bid

The Government will pledge National Lottery money to support a British bid to stage the football World Cup in 2006, it was revealed yesterday.

Virginia Bottomley, Secretary of State for National Heritage, said that John Major was prepared to back any such proposal by the Football Association "all the way". And holding out a vision of Britain as a focal point of international sporting events, she that said ministers were also prepared to fund a bid for the 2008 Olympic Games.

The idea of hosting the World Cup early in the next century has been mooted in British football circles for some months. Many see the current three-week Euro 96 championship, which opened on Saturday, as preparing the route for such a bid. However, both ministers and football officials are well aware that any significant hooligan problem during the next few weeks could wreck plans for a second tournament.

David Davies, the FA's director of public affairs, said its overwhelming priority was to "ensure a successful festival of football" at Euro 96. But he admitted that any decision to go for the World Cup would have to be taken within the next few months and it was something that FA was keen to consider.

"There is no lack of adventure to press ahead with this at the right time, and the offer of help from politicians - financial or otherwise - will not be spurned," he said.

Mrs Bottomley, writing in the Sunday Express, said: "The Prime Minister and I are determined that we don't have to wait another 30 years before we once again play host to the sporting nations of the world.

"If the FA decide to make a bid for the World Cup in 10 years' time - they say they are shortly to make a decision - this government will back them all the way." Carefully avoiding any figures, she added: "And if it takes lottery money to attract the Olympic Games to Britain in 2008 we are ready to spend it."

Euro 96 was being played at eight of the most modern stadia in Europe, she said, and in 10 years' time England would have a new national stadium to go with the pounds 23m spent on redeveloping Hampden Park in Glasgow and the pounds 46m allocated for the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff.

The FA, who will decide on any bid by Christmas at the latest, would be probably competing with Germany to stage the 2006 tournament. It last hosted the competition in 1974 - eight years after England.

Privately, the FA is confident that a smooth and hooligan-free Euro 96 would be a giant step towards having the World Cup. Already officials from some other nations see the current tournament as a role model and have contacted their English counterparts to find out how it is being organised. Others see the timing of Mrs Bottomley's remarks as an attempt to milk the propaganda value of the current championships to boost the Government's popularity.

Yesterday the Labour MP Gerald Kaufman, chairman of the Commons National Heritage Select Committee, said he would welcome the World Cup in Britain as well as the 2008 Olympics, but was puzzled how the Government thought that just pumping in money would bring the tournament here.

Match reports, Sports Section