title: Millennium Commission
text: The Millennium Commission, a United Kingdom public body, was set up to celebrate the turn of the millennium. It used funding raised through the UK National Lottery to assist communities in marking the close of the second millennium and celebrating the start of the third. The body was wound up in 2006.
  
  Composition 
  
  Set up in 1993 by the National Lottery etc. Act 1993, the Commission was an independent non-departmental public body. Commissioners were appointed by the Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister; the Chair of the Commission was, for most of its life, the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, and for most of its life a second government minister was also a Commissioner. During Tessa Jowell's tenure as Chair the second Minister was Richard Caborn, as Minister for Sport, who preceded Jowell in the department by one day, and who left the department contemporaneously (when Gordon Brown became Prime Minister).
  
  Closure 
  
  The Commission was wound up in December 2006 and its role was transferred to the Big Lottery Fund.
  
  Examples of projects funded 
  
  The Commission invested over £2 billion in buildings, environmental projects, celebrations and community schemes. Funded projects include:
   Black Country Urban Forest
   Centre for Life, Newcastle upon Tyne
   Dundee Science Centre
   Eden Project, Cornwall
   Falkirk Wheel
   Glasgow Science Centre
  Winchester Science Centre (formerly INTECH)
   Five Millennium piers for London River Services
   Magna Science Adventure Centre, Rotherham
  Millennium Bridge, London
   Millennium Dome, London
   The Millennium Forest for Scotland project
   Millennium Greens in cities, towns and villages
   Millennium Point, Birmingham
   Millennium Seed Bank Project, West Sussex
   Millennium Stadium, Cardiff
   National Centre for Popular Music, Sheffield (closed in 2000)
   National Space Centre, Leicester
   Odyssey Centre, Belfast
   Dynamic Earth, Edinburgh
   ReDiscover, Newcastle upon Tyne (joint venture with the Wellcome Trust and the Wolfson Foundation)
   Spinnaker Tower, Portsmouth
  Sheffield Winter Garden
   The Deep, Hull
   Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff
   A number of village halls and community meeting places
  
  Commissioners 
  
  There were initially nine commissioners – two ministers, one appointed by the opposition, and six independents. The number of commissioners was reduced to five as the work of the commission decreased.  The final members were:
  
   Richard Caborn (Chair), Minister for Sport
   Floella Benjamin, actress and author
   Heather Couper, broadcaster and writer on space 
   Judith Donovan, health and safety commissioner
   Michael Heseltine, former Conservative cabinet minister
  
  Previous commissioners
  
   Virginia Bottomley
   Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville
   Lord Clark of Windermere
   Jack Cunningham
   Matthew d'Ancona 
   Richard Scott, Earl of Dalkeith 
   Stephen Dorrell 
   Sir John Hall
   Robin Dixon, 3rd Baron Glentoran 
   Sir Simon Jenkins
   Tessa Jowell
   Lord Montague of Oxford
   Mo Mowlam
   Barbara Roche
   Baroness Scotland of Asthal
   Baron Smith of Finsbury
  
  References
  
  External links
   Millennium Commission website (archived 22 December 2006)
  
  Organizations established in 1993
  Organizations disestablished in 2006
  Defunct public bodies of the United Kingdom
  1993 establishments in the United Kingdom
  Turn of the third millennium