How much is enough?

It's another big rollover in the Euromillions lottery. An estimated £126 million. That's enough to make anyone sit up and listen, and want to buy a ticket. I play the lottery once in a while, and Euromillions even less frequently. I put my hands up to being sucked in to having a go when the big money rollovers come up, and why wouldn't I, the money would come in handy.

But I started thinking on the way to work this morning. £126m is a lot of money. An awful lot of money. Does anyone really need to win that much?

I remember when the National Lottery launched, and the jackpot was about £6 or £7 million. That seemed like a lot of money back then. It was, and it still is. But next to £126m it sounds like small change. I have been involved in conversations to that effect, where it's hard to imagine anything other than disappointment at winning the Saturday draw, and missing out on the big one.

But how would be enough? I started to think, what if we capped the possible jackpot winnings to, say £30m, but continued to allow the winnings to roll-over. Then, what if, we gave the rest of the winnings to a charity. That money could do a lot of good. Imagine, in East Africa, where millions are starving and losing their lives. That money could go so far to help.

Red Nose Day 2011 has raised £102m to date. An incredible sum, but Euromillions manages to raise that in a few short weeks in jackpot payments.

It actually made me feel a bit sick when I thought of it like that.

So how about it. Let's be a bit greedy, and indulge ourselves in our dreams. But £30m is more than enough. Why not let someone less fortunate win.