From December 28th to 29th, the National Civil Affairs Work Conference was held in Beijing. The meeting summed up the civil affairs work in 2019, analyzed the situation, studied and deployed the work in 2020, and mobilized the national civil affairs system to fight for winning the battle against poverty and building a well-off society in an all-round way.
On December 29th, the government wechat "China Civil Affairs" of the Ministry of Civil Affairs released the data map of "Civil Affairs Work in 2019" produced by the new government media of the Ministry of Civil Affairs. Among them, the data map revealed that in 2019, the welfare lottery sales were 184.632 billion yuan, and the public welfare fund was raised about 53.7 billion yuan.
The Paper noted that compared with the official welfare lottery sales data in 2018, it dropped by about 30 billion yuan in 2019.
On August 15th, 2019, the Statistical Bulletin on the Development of Civil Affairs in 2018 issued by official website of the Ministry of Civil Affairs showed that the welfare lottery sales in China in 2018 was 224.56 billion yuan, an increase of 7.58 billion yuan or 3.5% over the previous year. The lottery public welfare fund was raised to 64.36 billion yuan, an increase of 3.6% over the previous year. In the whole year, the civil affairs system spent a total of 25.17 billion yuan on lottery public welfare funds, an increase of 3.0% over the previous year, including 17.15 billion yuan for social welfare and 910 million yuan for social assistance.
In fact, some media have noticed a sharp decline in welfare lottery sales in 2019.
According to the report of national business daily on August 4, 2019, "In June, the national lottery sales totaled 34.767 billion yuan, a decrease of 23.862 billion yuan or 40.7% compared with the same period of the previous year. Not only did the monthly data decline, but the reporter combed the lottery sales data in the first half of the past decade and found that the lottery sales showed negative growth year-on-year for the first time in the first half of this year. "
With regard to the decline in sales data, the national business daily report quoted experts in the lottery industry as saying that in early 2019, in order to regulate the lottery market, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Civil Affairs and other departments strengthened the supervision of high-frequency quick-opening games and quiz games, extended the sales time of high-frequency quick-opening games and reduced the number of lottery games. In addition, the ban on internet lottery sales also has an impact on lottery sales.
It is worth mentioning that the corruption case of China Welfare Lottery Issuance Management Center exposed in 2017 and 2018 has aroused widespread public concern.
According to an article published on November 9, 2018 on the website of the State Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, "Reducing repression, treating both the symptoms and the root causes, and reconstructing the credibility of Welfare Lottery", the discipline inspection and supervision team stationed in the Ministry of Civil Affairs started with typical cases to promote the formation of a good political ecology. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the CPC Central Committee and the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection have seriously investigated and dealt with a series of corruption problems in the Welfare Lottery field, and seriously held accountable three members of the former party group of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the head of the discipline inspection team stationed there. The Central Leading Group for Inspection Work and the State Supervision Commission of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection have successively handed over dozens of clues concerning bureau-level cadres of the Ministry of Civil Affairs to the Discipline Inspection and Supervision Group of the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
The Discipline Inspection and Supervision Team of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Party Group of the Ministry of Civil Affairs unified their thinking and understanding, took practical measures to reduce the stock and curb the increase, and seriously investigated and dealt with the violations of laws and regulations of 14 bureau-level leading cadres, including Bao Xuequan and Wang Suying, former directors of China Welfare Lottery Issuance Management Center, and Wang Yunge and Feng Lizhi, former deputy directors, in an effort to reshape the new image of the welfare lottery industry and revive its credibility.
In January, 2019, according to the report of WeChat official account’s "China Lottery News of Public Welfare Times" on the WeChat of Public Welfare Times, after the implementation of the new Regulations on Function Allocation, Internal Organizations and Staffing of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the internal organizations of the Ministry of Civil Affairs in charge of welfare lottery management have changed. Before the reform, the welfare lottery management was in charge of the Department of Social Welfare and Philanthropy Promotion. After the reform, the welfare lottery management has been refined, and the planning and finance department and the newly established charity promotion and social work department are in charge. (The Paper reporter Jiang Ziwen)