Less the 30 FOBT's BUT Berwick’s FOBT's rake in £30m

stfu clive. at what meeting did you dream up the 1p a week analogy. that does not even begin to make sense and just sounds desperate.

what sorted of a twisted **** are you that you would honestly try and hoodwink the public with that BS.

just a thought but why not try the equation again and this this time, just for fun, why not add the actual number of FOBT users.

I think Clive is possibly getting a little excited this morning and has allowed his maths to slip a little.

The 1p actually equates to the weekly loss per person per machine each week. Nevertheless a weekly loss of around 30p per person isn't exactly headline grabbing. In fact it is about the same as the expected loss from buying a single £2 lottery ticket once a month.

Now of course the spread of losses is different with machines and the lottery however nobody seems to have these statistics so they just make them up.

and one person is too many

So by that reasoning then pretty much everything would end up being banned. All gambling must cease immediately. Alcohol prohibition must be brought in as well....... the list is endless.

The 1p or 30p figures make no sense, and are of no relevance.

You need to know how many FOBT plays there are in Berwick, before any reasoned stats can be established.

"So by that reasoning then pretty much everything would end up being banned. All gambling must cease immediately. Alcohol prohibition must be brought in as well....... the list is endless."

Poor attempt at twisting my words.

Many people enjoy gambling, many people enjoy alcohol. I include myself in both. However, I've yet to see someone come on here and tell me they enjoy FOBT's (bookmaker apologists aside). Is that because they don't really enjoy them, and are unhappy with their addiction ?

"People are proposing blanket regulations on the whole community and therefore I'm not sure why you are so threatened by an accurate consideration of the current risk to the whole community."

That sounds like an admission that FOBTs are a threat even though I shouldn't be worried about them. I'm not by the way.

Personally, I want to live in a society that protects the feckless. You, on the other hand, want one that takes advantage of them, and won't stop until everyone is in your grip.

Happy to protect the feckless, just not at a disproportionate cost to the rest of us. Hence why the alcohol, fast food and other gambling analogies are relevant.

Nobody i'm aware of is arguing there should be no controls just that further controls would not achieve the critic's aims. For the genuine critics it won't reduce problem gambling, as problem gamblers do not just use FOBTs and for the arbers on here it won't make the bookies accept their bets.

As for your earlier point regading FOBT users in Berwick, based on national figures the amount lost per player per week would be around £8.16. Not sure how that compares with the weekly spend of a crack cocaine user but i'd suggest the comparison is daft to say the least. The fact it is so often repeated by an individual who revels in his role as a paid peddler of the 'crack cocaine' for so many years makes it more laughable.

Clive what has this got to do with arbers ? As a low level Ladbrokes employee , does it effect your salary or daily life ?

This is about FOBT addicts, stick to the story in question.

Blinkered is quite an apt description.

he always bangs on about arbers harry. i have no idea why i think it is drilled into them that all punters are arbers & all arbers are evil.
the poor guy is twisted in knots & if you read a lot of his posts contradicts himself regularly & misquotes the disinformation he has been handed out by his paymasters.
i don't think he is the brightest bless him.

Warning over the perils of betting shop machines



Published on Monday 28 January 2013  http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/business/local-business/warning-over-the-perils-of-betting-shop-machines-1-4726856



A MEMBER of a gambling support group has spoken of the dangers of using machines in betting shops.



Fixed odds betting terminals in shops allow gamblers to place bets of up to £100 every 20 to 45 seconds, typically in roulette type games, meaning a user can lose thousands in just minutes.

Gambling companies kept £1.4bn from these machines and similar types across the country in 2011/12, an increase of 10 per cent, according to the Gambling Commission.

Betting shops are allowed to have a maximum of four machines in a shop.

Stefan Goodson, 22, of Fareham, is an ex-gambling addict and now attends Gambler’s Anonymous meetings in Portsmouth, Havant and Southampton.

He said newcomers regularly talk about their problems with the machines.

He said: ‘I don’t know what the attraction is, but it’s a compulsion – people I know love playing on them.

‘As a group we think that you shouldn’t be allowed to spend so much money in so little time – that’s what’s causing debt across the country.’

Stefan has not gambled since April but is still in thousands of pounds of debt.

It comes as the Campaign for Fairer Gambling is calling for the government to limit the maximum bet to £2 and increase the amount of time between playing, as well as remove game content.

The group have calculated an estimated £427,074,526.67 has been spent in Portsmouth, Havant, Gosport, Fareham and surrounding areas.

MP for Portsmouth South Mike Hancock said: ‘The relaxation of the rules which allow betting shops to have these machines and the availability of them – people literally walking in off the street – could lead to an enormous problem. The government should rethink the gaming laws on this issue.

‘Somebody somewhere is making a lot of money.’

n Call Stefan on 07572 501847 or visit the national website gamblersanonymous.org.uk for help

i knew we had gone to hell in a handcart a couple of years ago when i went down to the cheltenham festival.
i've been going for years & on the high street the PR girls are always out with the jockey gear on pushing various racing offers etc. that has all changed now though and there are more PR folk than ever out on the street but the racing doesn't get mentioned. all they do is relentlessly push free goes on the machines and it is the same when you walk into the shops.
i guess for every hundred or so punters you can get to have a spin you might hook a true compulsive. depressing stuff yet again.

What these bookmaker apologists don't seem to realise is that this forum is for people who like gambling. If it was a forum for baking, you could both understand why the baking fraternity think its a good idea to ban FOBTs, and why bookmakers might say they are ill-informed. This isn't a baking forum, and I'd expect a vast majority of the posters here are both gamblers, and have been in a bookmakers recently, and yet these are the people who say FOBTs are simply wrong.

I'm still waiting for someone, apart from the obvious ones, to praise FOBTs, and say what a wonderful addition they are to bookmakers and society. Or am I right in thinking that these people aren't really interested in any other form of gambling ?

Are you out there FOBT players ?

the only thing in there favour is that if there were no FOBTs there would probably be no shops and I do like to pop in now and again and have a few cash bets when in town

Not many but that was pre the explosion in online betting.

Should we ban Big Macs because of fat people?

clive , should we ban winning punters because they win ?

clive , should we ban winning punters because they win ?

Brilliant !

Clive ?

Choice of photo was just to throw some red meat to the lunatic fringe on here who think you can't express a view other then that of the herd's, without working for a bookmaker!

Rcing, you've already explained you are motivation is to maximise the levy. So you should be in favour of banning unprofitable customers.

Perhaps, the wiseheads on here can end the smokescreen of FOBTS and perceived harm, and explain how they believe banning FOBTs will make bookmakers relax their trading restrictions? Nobody has ever actually explained that.

Choice of photo was just to throw some red meat to the lunatic fringe on here who think you can't express a view other then that of the herd's, without working for a bookmaker!

I find it difficult to believe any sensible person would choose a photo of the odious Mr Williams unless he was him ? I do realise you couldn't admit to it. Your parasitic bosses might object to this level of PR.

Rcing, you've already explained you are motivation is to maximise the levy. So you should be in favour of banning unprofitable customers.

Failing to see the connection here ? Who mentioned the levy ? Another smokescreen, perhaps ?

Perhaps, the wiseheads on here can end the smokescreen of FOBTS and perceived harm, and explain how they believe banning FOBTs will make bookmakers relax their trading restrictions? Nobody has ever actually explained that.

Again, this seems to be your agenda only. Who mentioned bookmakers relaxing their restrictions ? Personally, I don't think it would make any difference to your odious policies, other than that to your profits.

the crack analogy does make some sense in that even amongst other addictive drugs crack has been seen to be unusually addictive both is the rapidness & rabidness of that addiction.   

the many studies done in australia are absolutely applicable here and even the governments own figures show an astonishing 80% of all problem gamblers got into problems due to pokie machines. i dare say that will be dismissed by the apologists though as they are not exactly the same machine.

the biggest lie of course is when the bookmakers say that they don't want problem gamblers in their shops. what % of profit would we guess the problem gambler provides alongside the more occasional user? the australian studies estimate 40%. i would not be surprised if it is higher here given that fewer people are likely to visit bookmakers as opposed to the social clubs where the machines in australia are located.