Clause 44 - Invitation to enter premises
Gambling Bill
10:45 am
Mr Malcolm Moss (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; North East Cambridgeshire, Conservative)
Clause 44 centres quite rightly on the importance of protecting children from invitations to enter premises. Under the Bill, most premises are prohibited from giving access to children, and the only exception is in clause 44(2). Amendments Nos. 297 and 298 are probing amendments, which deal with regional casinos and suggest removing subsections (2) and (3).
In light of the Bill or of guidance to the gambling commission, a proportion of the floor area in large regional casinos will be set aside for non-gaming activities. In fact, as things stand, the largest proportion will be devoted to such activities, and we are very much in favour of that. However, casinos, of themselves, are not family entertainment centres, and even those areas in which gambling does not take place
might, depending on the design of a particular regional casino, retain a gambling focus. Do we want to create the impression that the sort of hard gambling that can be found in certain casinos is an everyday social activity?
Why will the Government protect children from the gambling environment in a large casino, which will also have non-gambling areas, but apparently allow them to witness gambling on an even grander scale elsewhere? That includes category A machines, which will not be in large and small casinos but only in regional casinos. Why will we allow children to see such activity there from the sidelines? Do we want children to associate casinos and gambling with glamour?
These probing amendments are designed to elicit an assurance that the Government are clear in their own mind about how they will erect Chinese walls between the casino activity in big regional casinos and the other leisure activities that are part of the operation, whether those activities involve theatres, bar areas, swimming pools, ice rinks or whatever. You name it—all sorts of combinations have been proposed. If the Government are serious about protecting children, it is important that, either in the Bill or in an assurance from the Government in the guidance, proper barriers should be in place between the gaming area and the other leisure activities. We would like the Minister to clarify what those barriers will be, but certainly we would not be in favour of children being able to see through in any way to a gaming area or to be in cool-out areas, where people go to rest and think about their losses before going back in.