Ed Miliband outside a William Hilll betting shop in Kilburn, north London.
Labour would empower local councils to ban fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) from high streets, Ed Miliband has confirmed.
The Labour leader claimed the FOBTs, which let gamblers bet £300 a minute or £18,000 an hour, were being targeted at poor people.
Councils would be given a range of powers including stopping the spread of FOBTs, reducing their number or banning them altogether. On a visit to Kilburn in north London, Miliband said: “In towns and cities across Britain today, you can see how the old bookies are being turned into mini casinos. In the poorest areas, these are spreading like an epidemic along high streets with the pawn shops and payday lenders that are becoming symbols of Britain’s cost-of-living crisis.
“In Newham [east London] there are 87 betting shops with an estimated 348 machines and across the five Liverpool constituencies there are 153 betting shops with around 559 FOBTs.”
He said they acted as “a magnet for crime and antisocial behaviour”.
The machines, which have been lightly regulated since they arrived in 2001, have been dubbed the “crack cocaine of gambling”. Critics say they are highly addictive and lead to crime and poverty.
But FOBTs bring in big profits for the UK gambling industry, yielding the sector about £1.5bn last year.
Laws exist to restrict betting shops to a maximum of four betting machines each, but Labour has said this has meant more betting shops in clusters, sometimes open from 7.30am to 10pm. The biggest firms have already almost filled their quota: William Hill and Ladbrokes have, on average, 3.9 machines a shop.
Clive Efford MP, the shadow sport minister, said: “Betting shop operators have been in denial that there is a problem. We will make sure that councillors have the powers to respond when concerns are raised in their local communities.”
Labour would put betting shops in a separate class, making it easier to use planning laws to control their number.
A betting shop can open in any premise that used to be a bank, building society, estate agent, employment agency or similar without needing planning permission. This has enabled the spread of betting shops on the high street, with local authorities powerless to intervene.
Labour would also modify the Gambling Act 2005 to give councils powers to review betting shop licences in their area and retrospectively reduce the number of machines in existing betting shops.
Labour would also tackle their addictive quality by increasing the time between plays, requiring pop-ups and breaks in play. Critics say it is the immersive nature of these games that lulls people into losing more money than they intend.
Efford said it was necessary to introduce pop-ups on the machines that warn players how long they have played, and how much they have betted and lost. There would also have to be two members of staff present at all times. “If they [betting firms] fail to comply with this we will make this a licensing condition of form betting shops that have FOBT machines,” he said.
Campaigners said it was “fantastic news” that Miliband was taking action. Owen Baily, a reformed gambling addict who now runs the Gambling Centre, which helps combat addiction, said the “machines suck money out of communities, families and their children. They are having a massive impact.”
The government has commissioned a review into the impact of gaming machines before deciding whether to impose its own restrictions. The gambling industry denies FOBTs are more harmful or addictive than other forms of gambling.
The Liberal Democrats voted to give councils the power to limit the number of betting shops in their area at their party conference in September.
The Association of British Bookmakers condemned the plans. “This announcement has nothing to do with helping problem gamblers; it is simply about playing politics with the jobs of 40,000 people, and the enjoyment of 8 million customers for no reason,” said a spokesperson.
