Hi Everyone,
Sorry it has taken a while to update you this week.
We have now received a response from the Gambling Commission, however it is still throwing up inconsistencies with advice that they have given to the public and to us on previous occasions.
As a result of this our lawyers are again looking into it further.
I'm sorry we've been pretty vague about this, but whilst we are still seeking legal advice, it's only appropriate that we don't publicise any official correspondence at this time.
Today we have been speaking to a colleague of Steve's with more specific knowledge of Gaming. He is having a meeting with his superior on Wednesday, and has pencilled in a meeting with us for Monday/Tuesday next week.
We have also written to Peter Mandelson tonight, at the Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, urging him to intervene on our behalf.
We promise that we will not prolong this process any longer than necessary, none of us want that, but neither do we want to throw in the towel and then someone say; "Oh if only you'd waited a little longer, or tried this, or asked that"....
Of course we are aware that all our entrants are waiting for a positive outcome to this, so we are determined to continue, until we have exhausted every avenue.
Thank you for remaining as patient and supportive as you have been so far. We still have this dream to realise for us here, and for you too. We are doing everything we can to achieve this, and can only do it with you alongside us.
We know that you'd all love to help us in whatever way you can, and if there is anything you can do we will let you know.
We appreciate all the efforts you have made thus far.
Brian Wendy and Louisa
Hi Everyone,
Well I thought I would have had something to report today but – no.
On Monday 10th November, I sent this email to the Compliance Administrator at the Gambling Commission:
Could you please acknowledge for me that Mr. Kavanagh is in receipt of the response from our solicitor Mr. S.
Kuncewicz sent on the 31st October.
He sent his response to Mr. Kavanagh and several other members of the commission, but we have not had any
acknowledgement as yet.
It would be nice to know if we are receiving careful consideration or if we are at the bottom of a very
busy in-tray at the moment.
Kind Regards
Wendy Wilshaw
I received the following response:
Dear Mrs Wilshaw,
Please accept our apologies for not having acknowledged receipt of the response from Mr Kuncewicz. I am informed
that the matter is currently being considered and we anticipate a response will be sent to Mr Kuncewicz either
today or tomorrow.
Kind regards
As I write we have still heard nothing yet.
I’ll keep you posted.
Wendy Wilshaw
Hi Everyone,
Just a quick note, for those of you who requested more frequent updates, to say that on Friday 31st October, our solicitor sent in his substantive and very comprehensive response to the most recent correspondence from the Gambling commission in relation to our Competition.
He stated that we would look forward to their response within seven days of the date of the E-Mail.
He informed them that a hard copy, containing 1000 attachments (of support and ‘evidence’, from our entrants and the general public) has been sent to Tom Kavanagh (Deputy Chief Executive at the Gambling Commission).
We now await the positive decision that we are all hoping for.
The Wilshaw Family
Hi Everyone, This is just to reassure everyone that we are still here and working hard behind the scenes to bring our competition to it’s rightful conclusion, and to answer a few of the questions that you are raising.
The funds are being securely held for you all, by Paypal on a 0% interest basis. These funds are inaccessible to us
until the completion of the house transfer to the winner.
We would love to have been in a position to donate the interest to charity, but unfortunately that choice is out of
our hands.
The legal response has taken longer than anticipated for Steve to finalise, but along with his very professional
response we have formulated a ‘laymans’ version, which you can read below.
We know that some of you have been very proactive with your support and might like to see all the guidelines involved
in the Gambling Act concerning prize draws and see how we feel that we have met them with the structure of
our competition.
We cannot say how thankful we are that you are keeping faith in us and our original concept, of doing something
wonderful, for one lucky person, and allowing all the other entrants the opportunity to share in the fantasy,
that winning Oldborough Retreat has become.
We could never have dreamed of the impact that this competition would have on so many family’s lives.
Wendy, Louisa, and Brian
View the requirements of the Gambling Act 2005
Just a quick note as I know everyone is anxious to know what is happening at the moment.
This week has been about nationally and locally informing the general public of the situation we have been facing with the Commission.
We have read and categorised all the support emails so they are in a format that Steve our solicitor can use most productively.
We have received some very useful statistics from the website technicians that have been researched from our Analytics Pages.
Steve has almost completed our lengthy response to the Gambling Commission, which should be ready to send today or tomorrow.
We don’t know how the infrastructure works at the Commission so we can’t really comment on a timescale for a definitive decision at this point, but they are obviously aware that the draw was postponed.
We will only resume on the basis of a favourable decision.
Thank you to all who have responded and sent in constructive suggestions to help with the cause.
We will continue to update you any new developments.
The Wilshaw Family
We are so sorry to have to tell all of our entrants that the Draw has been postponed.
The Gambling Commission have begun looking into the concept of House Competitions generally and as part of that process we have contacted and are in discussions with them to confirm that the competition meets their requirements.
At this late stage of proceedings, the Gambling Commission have asked for more information on the Competition question, despite the fact that we approached them for guidance before the start of the competition in March of this year, only to be told that they had no issues with our conduct or the running of the competition.
It seems that after our success, which was only made possible by our entrants and the public support which we’ve received, a number of copycat projects have launched which the commission are concerned may not comply with their guidelines. This means that they are looking into all similar competitions and raising issues over the concept of dealing with property in this innovative way.
We have been asked to demonstrate why we believe that our question prevented a significant number of people from participating in the competition, which is the main legal test to decide whether or not the competition is authentic rather than a simple lottery or game of chance.
We and our Solicitor have responded immediately and told the Commission that only a small minority of the population have purchased coarse fishing licences over the past year – around 500,000 from an adult population of 45 million. As such, only a small minority of the public would know the answer to our question without any basic research over the internet which the Commission’s guidance stated was in line with the current legislation.
We realise that the Commission will need to make checks given the sheer number of sites coming on line, but we are of course frustrated by the timing of their queries and the fact that they have previously made open statements to us and to the national press that the Competition was lawful. We were asked to postpone the draw on October 3rd and since then have done everything we can to assist the commission and to demonstrate that we have followed their guidelines to the letter, however the process is still ongoing and as such we have no choice but to postpone the draw to ensure that all of our entrants still receive their chance to win.
We, like you, are desperately disappointed by this news, coming so close to what should have been the most exciting time in this project and the realisation of handing the keys to our dream property to the lucky winner. We are also devastated that, by changing the rules after the process began, the Commission may decide that our dream may not be realised.
We are continuing our discussions with the Commission and can reassure all of you that the entry fund is still in place and still safe. The worst case scenario is that all of our entrants will be issued with a full refund if the draw does not go ahead.
In the meantime, we are eternally grateful for all of your support and would be delighted if you could forward on any messages of support to us via E-Mail to brianwilshaw@eclipse.co.uk with the words ’Public Support’ in the subject line so that we can pass them on to the Gambling Commission in the hope of making this dream a reality.”
(We hope that you can appreciate that we may not be able to send you an acknowledgment for any of these emails of support).
Brian, Wendy and Louisa Wilshaw and Steve Kuncewicz (Solicitor)
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