The UK Gambling (Licensing & Advertising) Bill successfully passed its Third Reading in the House of Commons on Tuesday and now heads to the House of Lords for further debate and desk-thumping. The legislation, which is expected to take effect May 1, 2014, would require all UK-facing online gambling firms to hold a UK Gambling Commission-issued license and pay a point-of-consumption tax (POCT) currently set at 15% of gross gaming revenue. The government claims the Bill’s primary aim is not revenue generation but consumer protection, although few people outside of government have swallowed that line.
There are also skeptics within government, like Tory MP and former bookie Philip Davies (pictured), who offered his support for the Bill, “for the real reason behind it, which the Government dare not say: it will allow them to tax gambling companies currently based in places such as Gibraltar and allow people in the UK who place bets with those companies to be subject to taxation. I think that is a perfectly legitimate thing for the Government to do, but I understand that for legal reasons within the EU they do not want to say it.”
Bottom line of Tuesday’s hot debate action? A raft of new clauses were proposed, none of which survived their run-in with the iron fist of Minister for Sport Helen Grant. But hey, there’s space to fill, so here’s some of the day’s best quips, many of which also emerged from Davies’ spot on the bench.
Allowing brick-and-mortar casinos to offer mobile tablet gambling on site was something that had been expected to be in the Bill but never made the final text. Davies noted the absurdity that casino patrons could gamble on their iPads while standing on the street outside the casino, but not inside the casino. “We cannot allow the law to be so behind the times; some of us may be considered luddites, but the law should not exist to protect luddites in such a way.”
Davies was less enthusiastic about the “completely pointless” requirement for a kitemark on all UK-licensed gambling sites. “I admire the naivety, I suppose … that if we put a kitemark on the bottom of every licensed website, every punter in the country will ignore all better odds available and just bet blindly because of the kitemark. It would be nice if the world worked that way, but that is cloud cuckoo land.”
Davies said the proposed authorization to compel financial info from bookmakers while investigating suspicious activity was unnecessary, given the existing level of cooperation the Gambling Commission gets from its bookies. Davies also suggested that sport bore a greater responsibility for policing match-fixing than bookmakers, who, as Davies observed, are match-fixing’s primary victims. “To say that bookmakers offer products that therefore encourage sportsmen to fix matches is like blaming retailers for shoplifting by putting products on display.”
Labor MP Gerry Sutcliffe provided some unintentional humor via his desire for a reduction in the number of gambling ads that can be shown on television before 9pm. Sutcliffe bravely copped to feeling intimidated by Bet365 pitchman Ray Winstone. Sutcliffe claimed to be “a big fan” of Winstone’s cinematic oeuvre, but “he almost pressures people into betting in those adverts.” Sutcliffe then sat down, presumably because he’d nearly soiled himself at the very thought of Carlin from Scum asking him where his tool was.
Davies closed out his day hoping that the UK Gambling Commission wouldn’t embark on what he called “empire building” as it prepares to deal with the return of operators who fled the UK last decade for more tax-friendly jurisdictions like Alderney, Antigua, the Isle of Man or Gibraltar. Davies noted that these companies are “already particularly well regulated by the authorities there, which is why the Bill is complete nonsense from any regulatory or licensing perspective.” Nonetheless, Davies hoped “that the revenue raised will be useful in paying down our debts.”
