Politics
Balancing planning law with gambling rights
Betting shops have been promised that the change to Machine Gaming Duty will be revenue neutral and that any changes to planning law will take the industry into account. EVIDENCE
M
inister for gam- bling John Penrose has sug- gested that the issues surround-
ing betting shop ‘prolifera- tion’ and the complaints of some local councils are teething problems as author- ities get to grips with what is still a relatively new Gam- bling Act.
Giving evidence to the Culture Media Sport Com- mittee, Penrose said: “From what I can see, the majority of those problems have been either teething problems of one kind or another, or indi- vidual local authorities getting used to running this process. Not many people have come to the Depart- ment and said that they think there is a fundamental problem with the way in which the powers are framed and that they should be drawn in a different way. “Clearly, now that the shake-down process is largely done and we have had a period for everybody to get accustomed, if people come back to us, we will listen to that very carefully, but up until now, that has not been a major theme of what people have been saying to us.” Penrose said that Depart-
ment for Communities and Local Government is about to issue a consultation on planning policy, which will contain measures that will affect gambling operators, but added that the govern- ment had to ‘make sure that the interplay between gam- bling regulation and plan- ning is rightly based’. He added: “We have an escalat- ing pyramid of severity of regulation, heavy-handed- ness of regulation or inten- sity of regulation depending on the perceived risk of what kind of occupation is going on.”
On the subject of gaming machines, Penrose said that his department works ‘on the basis of available evi- dence’ and that there was no reason to place further restrictions on bookmak- ers. “I have to proceed on the basis of evidence, other- wise we are playing with people’s jobs and economic well-being, as much as any- thing else. We shouldn’t be undermining that unless we have a jolly good, social evi- dence base to back up the assertion that it is causing a problem. If it is, that is a very good reason for interfering. But we have to have that evi- dence base first.”
However, he also sug- gested that the ABB’s attempts to loosen some of the gaming machine restric- tions is doomed to failure with only anecdotal evi- dence, commenting the ‘evi- dence base cuts both ways’. Meanwhile, economic secretary to the Treasury Chloe Smith fielded ques- tions about the forthcoming change to Machine Gaming Duty, which she rigorously maintained would be ‘revenue neutral’. She explained: “We are not aiming to raise addi- tional revenue from the exer- cise. The tax will be linked to takings so, again, it almost refers back to the point about profitability. It is our intention to try to be fair within that.
“I have mentioned sus- tainability, specifically with reference to the VAT treat- ment of different machines. It is important to make that clear, both for operators and the UK government. There will also be some measure of predictability. There will be technological changes in future, which will come down the line, and this measure is intended to place that on a footing that can be easily understood.”
MP pushing for
Gambling Act
REMOTE ANALYSIS
John Penrose was pretty positive about the gambling industry while giving evidence, rather than the lukewarm, apologetic approach that some of his predecessors took after negative press reaction to the Gambling Act. While he
acknowledged that gambling caused problems for a minority of people, he was quite upbeat about the industry in general: “For the vast majority of the population, gambling is a bit of harmless fun and it employs a lot of people, contributes quite a lot to our GDP and so on. In that respect, it is something that we should welcome and it lightens up everybody’s lives.”
Caborn says there’s been no LBO proliferation PLANNING F
ormer minister for gambling Richard Caborn has defended the Gambling Act that he helped put through Parliament and scorned reports that since its inception that there has been a proliferation of betting shops on the high street.
Giving evidence to the Culture Media Sport Select Committee, Caborn commented: “I personally don’t think that there is such a proliferation. I asked my planners about it. There was a meeting of the Core Cities Group at the end of November, when this was on the agenda of the core city plan- ners. At a meeting of the Core Cities planning forum last week, one city raised the issue of betting shops on the high street. Informa- tion was requested on whether the proliferation of betting shops on the high street was becoming an issue for Leeds council. None
16 BettingBusinessInteractive • FEBRUARY 2012
RICHARD CABORN: ‘TRYING TO BRING BETTING AND GAMBLING INTO THE LEISURE INDUSTRY’
of the other core cities thought that there was a problem, and neither do we. The takeover of empty shops of a chain and the
supermarket multiples invasion is more of a problem for them.” Caborn explained that book- makers can’t open betting shops just anywhere: “They are class A2. Class A2, as you know, is banks, building societies and betting shops. They cannot go to A1 without permission. It is well within the power of the local authority to say no to a premises that wants to move from class A2 to class A1. They can move within class A2, but that is all. That is either a bank or a building society. It is quite interesting that they put betting shops, banks and building societies all together: they are all gamblers.
“I think that if they want to move from that, they have to go through the local authority planning department and the local author- ity can stop it. There are no more betting shops now than there were
then. In fact, I think that there are fewer betting shops now.” Former culture secretary Tessa Jowell admitted that the Gam- bling Act was distorted by the way it was passed - in the wash- up session before a general elec- tion - but that was how the legislative system worked: “You have to accept the realities of life in government, and this was leg- islation that was reaching its final stages right up against a general election. What I was absolutely clear about was that we had to secure the regulatory framework and the public protection that the Act was going to create, other- wise there would be quite sub- stantial public risk.” Caborn added: “We were trying to bring betting and gambling into the leisure industry in a responsi- ble way. Has it achieved that? By a general measurement, yes it has.”
CHLOE SMITH: ‘NOT AIMING TO RAISE ADDITIONAL REVENUE’
backbench Conserva- tive MP has introduced an Offshore Gambling (Licensing) Bill in a bid to alter the Gambling Act to require all operators selling into the British market to hold a Gambling Commis- sion licence and contribute to the Horserace Betting Levy. West Suffolk MP Matthew Hancock, who registered £46,000 of donations from racing interests between 9 February 2011 and 11 May 2011, introduced the bill under the 10 Minute ruling and it will be read a Second time on Friday 30 March. Hancock said that there was a ‘broad consensus’ that the levy system is broken and that an alterna- tive is needed: “The basis of any commercial arrange- ment must be a level playing field for bookmak- ers -onshore paying tax. That is what the simple change in the Bill would bring about. It would not solve all the problems of the world, but it would have a big effect. It would define the location of the bet as not where the bookie is but where the punter is. Techni- cally, gambling licences would be provided on the basis of point of consump- tion, not point of sale. A bookmaker who wants to market to British punters and take bets from them must be licensed by the Gambling Commission. Tax and levy would be paid. It is a simple change with a big effect.”
A
However Shipley MP Philip Davies suggested that such a change would not be so simple and cited Deliotte’s recent report into a point of consumption tax which suggested that a low rate would be needed to minimise the growth of grey market operators. He added: “We need to focus on why some betting companies are based abroad. The reason why is the level of taxation, and the level of taxation alone, so the Bill is a blunt instrument that does not address the need for a competitive rate of gross profits tax or allow businesses to reclaim their VAT in the UK. That would be a far more sensible point from which to start the debate, and one which many in the industry would be more willing to accept.”
amendment
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