‘A moral approach to gambling, not politics as usual’

The gambling sector and its allies have tried to disparage Andy Burnham for his recent stand against gambling venues, calling it prohibitionist and a “puritan perspective” with “worrying religious and moral connotations.” They even suggested his next targets could be places of worship and LGBTQ bars.

The Prime Minister has announced plans to scrap the “Aim to Permit” principle of the 2005 Gambling Act, which makes it extremely difficult for councils to deny licences to gambling venues. Slots venues in particular are worried. But while Burnham is neither a puritan nor a prohibitionist, they are right that he has a moral sense of purpose as he recognises these venues are harmful to both residents and the economy.

As well as aiming to permit gambling, the Gambling Act set out some worthy licensing objectives. They state gambling should be crime-free, it should be fair and open, and it should also protect children and others from exploitation. These objectives, however, were interpreted too narrowly by both regulators and policymakers, which is one of the primary motives for my campaigning on gambling reform.

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While “permit” was used as an excuse to support gambling growth, the “fair and open” and “no association with crime” objectives were diluted to mean mostly that gambling should be conducted correctly as sanctioned. The “protecting from exploitation” objective became little more than “safer gambling” measures such as age verification and deposit limits rather than anything that would reduce harm to a meaningful extent. Telling someone to gamble responsibly is still telling them to gamble.

There is a history behind the opposition to gambling venues and their slot machines. In 2013 Newham Council failed in their legal opposition to a new betting shop on its patch. They then supported my “Stop the FOBTs” (Fixed Odds Betting Terminals) campaign to reduce the maximum stake of these slot machines from £100 to £2 as a more effective way to curb these venues, because that’s where most profits were generated. They initiated a Sustainable Communities Act proposal to demand this, supported by 93 local authorities. 

In 2019 the campaign was successful and FOBT stakes were reduced. Prior to this, around 85 percent of betting shop turnover came from slot machines, yet sports betting was still judged to be their primary activity by the Gambling Commission. Today slots still account for 80 percent of turnover in betting shops and in slot-only Adult Gaming Centers (AGCs) it is 100 percent, and around 90 percent in bingo premises. But in traditional casinos, the only venues that arguably should ever have been permitted to offer modern electronic machines, it is less than 15 percent. 

‘Aim to permit’ theory has farcically allowed AGCs and bingo premises to create a de facto loophole whereby stockpiles of unused tablet computers can be classed as “slot machines”. This enables them to sidestep a rule designed to curb the most harmful, highest jackpot Category B machines to just 20 percent of the total number in a venue. If the total number of machines is higher then so is the 20 percent proportion, allowing them to pack in more. This appalling policy is a big driver behind the growth of AGC profits that Mr. Burnham so dislikes.  

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Our new gambling minister, Vicky Foxcroft MP, said recently at a Coalition to End Gambling Advertising fringe event at Labour conference that policy needs to be evidence-based. We already have evidence that reducing the speed of slot machines could reduce harm. There is also evidence that the mandated ‘Return to Player’ messaging on machines (“This game has an average percentage payout of 90 percent”) is more likely to encourage gambling than a message that shows the house edge (“This game keeps 10 percent of all money bet on average”) or even no message. 

In 2014, the Tories cleaned up part of the Labour 2005 Gambling Act mess by requiring advertising be limited to those who hold licences and introducing a point of consumption tax. But hundreds of licences were granted, effectively rubber-stamping offshore operations without scrutiny. The huge number and amounts of operator fines and settlements since then are indicators that too many bad actors were permitted to be licensed.

The worst example of what can happen when a gambling product is permitted without sufficient scrutiny was Football Index, a gambling platform that marketed itself as a “football stock market”. Licensed by the Gambling Commission in 2015, it collapsed six years later, with more than £100 million of customer money trapped inside. Some people lost life-changing sums, including money they had set aside for homes and retirement. The lessons are obvious: why allow any entity to have a license unless it guarantees to ring-fence player deposits? 

The government consultation on plans to scrap ‘Aim to Permit’ will soon be published. I will almost certainly support it, and while it will get significant pushback from the gambling sector, Burnham’s clear support makes this an important opportunity to finally give councils greater control over their high streets. It will be a welcome step in the right direction after so many years of compromised oversight of immoral operators.

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