National Lottery Lotto ticket price doubles to £2

The cost of a National Lottery Lotto ticket has doubled to £2.



The rise, the first since the lottery started in 1994, is part of a package of changes including bigger prizes, says operator Camelot.

Prizes for matching three numbers will rise from £10 to £25. Average jackpots are predicted to rise to around £5m on Saturdays and £2.5m on Wednesdays.

Camelot says this will mean more money for charities. It has raised £30bn for "good causes" since 1994.

Some other prizes will be reduced. Camelot estimates that the reward for matching five balls plus the bonus ball will average £50,000 instead of £100,000.

The prize for matching five balls is expected to average £1,000 instead of £1,500 while the average for matching four balls is expected to go up from £60 to £100.

Extra numbers printed on lottery players' tickets will be entered for a raffle with prizes of £20,000.

Total National Lottery sales have increased by 35% since 2002, when the game was officially renamed Lotto. Some 30 million tickets are reportedly bought every Saturday.

Haven't played it for years (since they turned down the RNLI as a good cause because they didn't save enough lives!) and this isn't likely to change my stance.

It's pure greed in my opinion? Winning millions of pounds is no longer enough, it now has to be tens-of-millions!