The People's 50 Million Pound Lottery Giveaway
Friday 7 December 2007 11:05pm - 11:20pm on ITV1.

Katie Derham invites viewers to vote for the UK project of national importance they would like see win a special £50 million lottery cash award in The People’s £50 Million Lottery Giveaway.

For this one-off award, the single biggest grant to be awarded by the Big Lottery Fund through a nationwide vote, four projects will showcase their ideas for the national landmark in separate programmes. Each show features a celebrity advocate who will champion the cause and invite the public to support their project to help secure the funding.

The celebrities – Ray Mears, Lorraine Kelly, Brian Blessed and Toyah Wilcox – and computer generated images (CGI) will bring each project to life, giving viewers an experience as close as possible to the finished project.

Tonight the four projects will be summarised and viewers invited to decide who they think deserves to win the £50 million good cause funding.

The results will be revealed in the following week’s ITV Evening News.

The four short-listed projects are:

Eden Project: The Edge
Representing the next evolution of the Eden Project in Cornwall, The Edge will feature the largest oasis in captivity. It is the perfect symbol of how life depends on energy and water and how life supports life, providing lessons on how we can engage with environmental issues of our age. Advocate: Ray Mears.

Sustrans: Connect2
79 practical transport link projects, from walking and cycle bridges to tunnels and ferries, aim to reunite communities and make journeys easier by overcoming obstacles like busy roads and rivers. Connect2 will improve local travel around the UK and benefit people’s health as well as the environment. Advocate: Lorraine Kelly.

Sherwood: The Living Legend
The restoration of Sherwood Forest will expand the ancient oak forest, provide environmentally friendly visitor facilities, create one of the biggest walking, cycling and horse riding networks in Europe and help local communities celebrate their connections to the forest’s nature, history and legends. Advocate: Brian Blessed.

Black Country Urban Park
In a journey spanning 400 million years, this project will unlock access to unique underground limestone caverns, the legacy of canals, and open green spaces across the Black Country. The park will link communities and open spaces in the area and include pedestrian, cycle and bridleways. Advocate: Toyah Wilcox.

Online voting will be available at www.thepeoples50million.org.uk from 26 November, with phone voting commencing on 7 December.

Katie says: "I’m really excited to be involved in The People’s £50 Million Lottery Giveaway. This is a huge grant which will benefit not only the surrounding region of the winning project but the whole of the UK too. So what are you waiting for? Get voting for your favourite project. This is your chance to have a say in where your Lottery money will be spent."

Voting arrangements:

• The following arrangements for voting have been agreed by Big Lottery Fund and ITV with guidance from Electoral Reform Services.

• Only one vote per recognised telephone number or email address will be allowed.

• Internet voting will open on 26 November at 9.00am at www.thepeoples50million.org.uk and close at 12.00 noon on Monday 10 December.

• Internet voting will allow a registered user to change their vote at any point between 9.00am on 26 November 2007 and 12.00 noon on Monday 10 December. The preference at close of voting will count as their vote.

• Telephone voting will be open at 9.00am on Friday 7 December and close at 12.00 noon on Monday 10 December.

• Calls will be charged at the standard national rate call charge for a BT landline, which will cost less than 10p if calling from a BT line. Calls from other providers and from mobiles will vary, and could be higher. Callers are advised to check with their provider to be certain of the cost. No profit will be made from the phone-in by either ITV or Big Lottery.

Guidance

• As voting will allow 1 vote per recognised telephone number, some phone systems using switchboards will only be able to vote once.

• Systems are in place to monitor and carry out checks for voting from ‘number withheld’ phone lines.

• Systems are in place to monitor and carry out checks where multiple email votes are received from a single IP address.

• Voting from numbers outside the UK will not be permitted.

• Electoral Reform Services will be reviewing data throughout the voting period. Their role is to provide advice and certify the final result.