The Good and The Bad

Being able to help others who have helped you is a very rewarding experience. In this case a children’s cancer charity support group based in Edinburgh has received a cash boost of £10,000 from a lottery winning couple who were dependent on the charity a few years back to help taxi their sick daughter to and from hospital. Andrew and Doreen McAllister won £4.2 million on the EuroMillions draw in 2005. The Children with Cancer and Leukaemia Advice and Support for Parents (CCLASP) charity warned it faced closure within two months and although more money is needed, the EuroMillions’ winners have staved closure. As the McAllisters said, it’s nice to help those who have helped you.

Money brings out the best and worst in people it is said. But lottery winning syndicates seem to have their fair share of problems. The more money won, the bigger the problems, as Raymond Chamberland, from Canada has found. He has a civil lawsuit with the courts, which alleges that he was part of a syndicate of six people that won $13.6 million in the summer of 2005. At the time the five syndicate members won $2.7 million each, and Chamberland claims he had been part of the syndicate, or pool as they call it in North America, playing the Lotto 6/49 for many months. He also claims they even told him he was a winner when the pool made its claim. This is not the first multi-million lottery claim in Canada, in 2003 a wife sued her estranged husband for her share of $30 million lottery win, which he’d waited a year to claim.