Gambling (Categorisation and Use of B2 Gaming Machines) Bill [HL]

Baroness Howe of Idlicote Excerpts

Friday 11th March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Howe of Idlicote (CB)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for introducing his more than timely gambling Bill, which proposes reducing the maximum stake per spin from £100 to £2. While I recognise that for many people gambling is not associated with harmful behavioural patterns, as the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, pointed out, I am keenly aware that some forms of gambling are much more associated with problematic forms of behaviour than others. Where that is the case, I strongly believe that policymakers have a responsibility to take robust action to protect the vulnerable.

I have previously moved amendments whose purpose has been to enhance protections for the vulnerable in relation to online gambling, which poses a unique set of challenges arising out of the fact that, unlike terrestrial gambling, it is available 24/7 and can be accessed without leaving one’s bedroom, let alone the house. FOBTs, similarly, represent a form of gambling that presents a particular challenge as far as problem behaviour is concerned. Rather than arising out of 24/7 availability, the central problem with FOBTs is the way in which they combine a very high speed of play with high stakes. This means that it is possible to lose large sums very quickly indeed.

Secondary research on the British gambling prevalence survey, conducted by Orford et al and published by the National Centre for Social Research, demonstrates that 26% of days that were spent playing FOBT machines were by problem gamblers as well as 23% of spend. These figures are noticeably high when compared with other gambling products and activities. Another study published by the National Centre for Social Research conducted by Heather Wardle et al meanwhile showed that 37% of loyalty cardholders who regularly gambled had experienced problems with machine play. That number is likely to be even higher for FOBT users when considering the fact that the research examined problem gambling prevalence for both fruit machines—B3 machines that were not particularly associated with problem play—and FOBTs. It is in any event the highest problem prevalence figure of which I am aware and means that, of any 100 people, 37 regular users are getting into difficulty. An attrition rate on that scale is wholly unacceptable.

The Campaign for Fairer Gambling has multiple testimonies of people whose lives have been wrecked by FOBTs. I will mention just two. One began playing FOBTs aged 18 and spoke of how they had lost over £150,000 on the machines over an eight-year period. Another explained that they had started playing FOBT machines placing small bets at first, and then going on to bet £100 per spin. They suggested that:

“These things very nearly killed me, and I’ve lost most of my family”.

Similarly, recent reports in the Guardian highlighted the financial difficulties that individuals may experience. One individual suggested:

“I started gambling when I was around 18, just 5p-a-go fruit machines or £1 bets on football acca’s. I then started playing the bigger fruit machines in snooker clubs and then eventually fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBT). This is by far the most addictive form of gambling that’s easily accessible to anyone. I could lose £80 in one night on fruit machines, but with a FOBT you can lose that in literally seconds”.

While the Government have seemed very slow to take the problem of FOBTs seriously, it is worth noting that the gambling industry feels increasingly uncomfortable about these products. Adrian Parkinson, who actually helped develop FOBTs, felt so troubled that he became a whistleblower on the industry and joined the Campaign for Fairer Gambling to campaign for the change in the law proposed by the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones. Yesterday, moreover, the former chairman of Paddy Power, Fintan Drury, called for fundamental change on FOBTs. Interestingly, he has done so in a way that provides an explanation for government inaction. He begins his Times column stating that:

“As chairman of a major betting firm I came to realise how high-stakes machines wreck lives”.

He continues:

“Did you know that it is possible for someone to gamble £18,000 an hour playing a Fixed Odds Betting Terminal in any betting shop in Britain? The industry does. So, to its shame, does the government but, as the estimated annual investment by gamblers on these machines runs to something like £50 billion, the benefit to the Treasury means that Whitehall turns a blind eye”.

The evidence is very clear that the gambling industry tends to concentrate FOBT machines in deprived areas. A report conducted by the Campaign for Fairer Gambling and verified by Landman Economics reveals that in 2014 more than £13 billion was gambled on high-speed, high-stakes gambling machines by the poorest quarter of England’s population—double the amount staked in the richest areas. The report reveals that, in the 55 most deprived boroughs of the country, high streets were lined with 2,691 betting shops in which £13 billion was gambled or staked on FOBTs by punters, and £470 million of that was lost last year. By contrast, there were 1,258 bookmakers in shopping centres in the 115 richest districts, containing the same population, where players staked £6.5 billion and lost £231 million in the same 12 months.

The report did not cover Northern Ireland because, quite shockingly, there is no requirement on those betting shops providing FOBTs to register them, so no one knows where they are located in the Province. However, the charity CARE conducted research in 2014 using betting shops as a proxy that demonstrated that more than a third of those shops are located in the 10% most deprived wards in Northern Ireland. Moreover, the British gambling prevalence survey itself showed that the unemployed were more likely to use FOBT machines in comparison with those in employment, in retirement, in full-time education or caring for the family. Is it right for the Treasury effectively to develop a tax that is targeted on the poor?

I am quite sure that the Chancellor would not want to be thought of as a modern-day Sheriff of Nottingham, but if Mr Drury is correct, and he should know, that would seem to be the case. Even those with the closest possible associations with Downing Street are deeply troubled. Former speechwriter for the Prime Minister, Clare Foges, who has actually called for FOBTs to be banned, likens the Government’s attitude to FOBTs as,

“curiously retro; like turning a blind eye while the poor destroy themselves on Gin Lane”.

Surely it is time for the Government to square up to the socially destructive reality of FOBTs. The public can see it, we can see it, even the gambling industry can see it. How long must it take for the Government to see it? I do hope that they will not allow the prospect of lost tax receipts to cloud their judgment on what is fast becoming one of the great social justice issues of our time. The best way to address this challenge is to do precisely what the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, proposes: namely, to reduce the maximum stake per spin from £100 to £2, bringing B2 machines into line with B3 machines. That is the solution proposed by Newham Council, supported by no fewer than 93 other councils in their Sustainable Communities Act application. It is the solution proposed by the Campaign for Fairer Gambling and by CARE. It is also the solution backed in a letter to today’s Times by a cross-party group of parliamentarians, including prominent Conservative MPs, NGOs and academics. Surely it is a proposal whose time has come. I very much hope that the Government recognise that today and adopt this Bill.