Gambling Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 2:30 pm on 22 February 2005.

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Photo of Lord Pendry Lord Pendry Labour 2:30, 22 February 2005

My Lords, I rise to take up one or two points of concern about the Bill. I recognise immediately that the Government have been listening to legitimate concerns during the passage of the Bill, which has been improved as a consequence. However, there is much more to be done to improve the Bill further and even at this late stage I am hopeful that further concessions can be made following this debate.

As a boy, I grew up at the seaside in the towns of Broadstairs and Ramsgate on the Isle of Thanet and I have many fond memories of those seaside towns. Indeed I frequently return to them. I remember well playing in the arcades of Ramsgate, known then as Merrie England. Although Merrie England is no longer there, traditional seaside arcades are still an important part of the economy of the Thanet towns today. The towns in Thanet—Ramsgate, Margate and Broadstairs—are like other seaside resorts in having traditional arcade economies, but that is not recognised by the Bill.

These arcades are not just about fun but are very important for many areas which have high unemployment and deprivation levels. In recent decades these areas have suffered greatly. Although the work being done by the current Government is helping them to get back on their feet, they certainly do not need another challenge to overcome. The loss of seaside arcades would indeed be a challenge too far.

In the case of Ramsgate and Broadstairs, the implications are even more serious. Your Lordships will have seen that among the most popular machines in a seaside arcade is the "pusher". To play these games you roll a coin on to a moving paddle, and once enough coins have built up on the paddle one or two are knocked off as prizes. What your Lordships probably do not know is that these machines were invented, and are now largely made, in Thanet. The world's two leading makers of these machines are in Thanet and they are very successful export businesses. The development work they do—the work that underpins their export business—is based on revenues from the British market.

If seaside arcades are no longer viable because of changes introduced in the Bill, then the traditional British seaside resort will disappear with them. If the seaside arcade is undermined, then pusher sales will be undermined. If pusher sales in the UK are undermined, then the export business for these machines will no longer be viable. Export business will decline and the high levels of unemployment in places such as Thanet will end up higher still. So whatever we do in the Bill, we must not undermine the seaside arcade.

Your Lordships will also know that the Budd report produced ideas that seriously challenged the viability of the seaside arcade. Those ideas were based on a view—a mistaken view in my opinion—that exposure to machines like cranes, pushers and low-stake fruit machines at a young age led to problem gambling in later life. That is nonsense, despite what has been said. There is not a shred of evidence to that effect.

When the Budd report was published, the campaign to ensure that seaside arcades remained viable was led by the Member for South Thanet in another place. He is now a Minister in the Department of Health and so no longer able to speak publicly on this issue. He put together a cross-party alliance to make the case that small-stake gambling in family centres did not create problem gamblers and successfully demonstrated that some of what Budd recommended would threaten the economic viability of low-stake machines and, by implication, threaten seaside arcades and seaside resorts. And the Government accepted that view at the time. Ministers agreed that low-stake machines could have a 30p stake and an £8 prize. The industry argued that these figures must be raised in line with inflation and Ministers agreed that, subject to future research showing no link with problem gambling, they would look at the issue again.

Ministers also promised that today's arcades would be able to continue as arcades and that councils could not retrospectively take decisions that would stop people selling their businesses as going concerns.

These promises largely satisfied the industry. They were made in another place, in private meetings and in speeches by Ministers to the industry. They are a matter of public record. And yet, on the face of it, the Government are now largely reneging on many of those promises. Although the Minister was helpful earlier, we are going to look for the amendments that he mentioned.

Will the Minister consider making a commitment that the Government will do nothing to undermine seaside arcades or machine manufacture, to honour the promises made to maintain the viability of small-stake machines and protect the grandfather rights of existing businesses and that he will attempt to rebuild a dialogue with the trade association BACTA to ensure the continuation of arcade businesses?

I am pleased, as I am sure the House will be pleased, that the Minister is prepared to look again at the issue of prizes of £5 and £8 for different sizes of teddy bears. One would be 6 inches high and the other 14 inches high. Is it really the business of government to restrict the size of children's teddy bears? Do the Government seriously think that by forcing children to have a smaller teddy bear they will save them from gambling problems in later life? Yet that is what, in effect, the Government are proposing. By so doing, they will limit the attractiveness of harmless amusement machines and thereby undermine the seaside amusement industry itself.

It is no good the Government saying that the Bill is protecting children. What it is doing is stopping children doing something they have always done and which does them no harm. And if by doing that they destroy an important part of the British seaside, they will have done neither children nor adults any favours.

It is also no good the noble Lord saying that resort casinos will bring regeneration to places such as Thanet to make up for the loss of arcades because no one is likely to build a resort casino, say, in Thanet—and if they do, it will only replace the district's two existing casinos.

I played in seaside arcades as a youngster and it did not turn me into a gambler. The most I have ever done is dabble on Littlewoods Pools and have the occasional flutter on the lottery when I remember to do so. Surely if anything can be said to be an example of harmless fun it is a young child trying to win a Winnie the Pooh doll in a seaside arcade.

If anyone develops a problem with gambling in later life, it will have had nothing to do with them playing pusher machines for 2p a time or winning a cuddly toy with a crane when they were children. I implore my noble friend to reinstate all the promises made to the seaside industry just a few years ago and to ensure that this harmless business can continue.

Before I sit down, I should perhaps mention that, despite what the Minister says, it is not just arcades in seaside resorts that are being unfairly treated by the Bill. British casinos, which have a proven track record of over 30 years of social responsibility, are being unfairly frozen out by the new regulatory environment—relegated to becoming second-class businesses by being denied the ability or right to compete with the new casinos.

That point made was made clear by the chairman of the Joint Committee, John Greenway, when he urged the Secretary of State for fairness to the existing industry. As the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, pointed out, a level playing field is all our British casinos are asking for.

Perhaps I may briefly bring to the Minister's attention another important issue that affects one of my other passions—football. The House will know that I am president of the Football Foundation. It has recently been brought to my attention by the football leagues in both England and Scotland that various betting companies—including pools companies and bookmakers—are refusing to pay copyright fees for use of their football fixture list when offering on-line fixed odds betting or running pools competitions. Such action could threaten the future of many smaller clubs. In the Scottish Football League, revenue secured from betting and pools companies is 21 per cent of the league's annual income.

Copyright in football fixtures was secured by the leagues in 1959, yet the pools companies have recently decided unilaterally not to pay. Such an issue would normally have been the subject of commercial dispute between the two parties. This issue has however been complicated by a recent judgment of the European Court of Justice regarding the database directive. This is a decision which is subject to legal scrutiny.

My time is up. However, I ask the Minister to look at this issue. I urge him to review the situation urgently in order that he can consider in detail the full range of options that we have to tackle on this issue and, we hope, introduce measures on the face of the Bill or in secondary regulations to the Bill.

I hope that the Minister will refer to those points in his reply.