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its future relies on betting profits! MPs will debate 'frictionless' betting affordability checks next week but bookmakers already have the tools to identify problem gamblers.
Rumour has it that Rishi Sunak’s constituents in Yorkshire, where there are a lot of racecourses and trainers’ yards, have been doing a good job of bending his ear over the levy deal between racing and the bookmakers.
As a result, the PM is said to have instructed the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to make sure an additional £20 million is included in the new levy deal by the end of April.
As much as the DCMS will not like this instruction, it is a very poor result for racing. First, the extra money will come from marginally increasing the percentage taken from bookmakers’ profits, but will not take into consideration their profits from foreign racing.
Secondly, this figure should be viewed in the context of an agreement between racing and the Government in 2019, which was going to yield £25 million from foreign racing and £55 million from moving the levy from a percentage of bookmakers’ profits to a percentage of their turnover.
It is hard to get away from the feeling that horse racing has lost the ear and the financial support of Westminster. Perhaps that will be confirmed by the number of MPs present in Westminster Hall next Monday?
There, a key debate on gambling affordability will be judged by just how many MPs actually turn up to listen and contribute. Some already have “prior commitments”.
Their absence will be regrettable because many of them appear to have already been indoctrinated by the Gambling Commission (GC), which has been peddling the questionable concept that “frictionless checks” are the solution to problem gambling.
The technology to carry out these tests, however, does not exist. Checks that betting operators are carrying out at the moment are leaving electronic fingerprints, which will affect future applications for mortgages and financing offers.
The consequences of these checks are anything but frictionless and yet many MPs who will not be attending the debate have been persuaded by the GC into believing they are just that.
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The current tests also offer an incomplete financial picture of each gambler that cannot take into account what an acceptable amount to spend on betting is for that individual.
There is now available, however, technology which can protect the three per cent of online gamblers who do have an addiction problem without impacting those who do not.
A number of academic studies have identified “markers of harm”, which can recognise habits that spot problem gamblers.
There are 16 main markers such as deposit behaviour, game selection, frequency of days spent wagering, number of bets per day and bet amounts. There are also 41 other markers which can raise alarms.
So it is well within reason to demand that betting operators use these systems and data to make sure their customers who are likely to have a problem can be identified and protected quickly.
The markers-of-harm approach will work because it can analyse patterns of behaviour rather than taking a blanket approach. After all, for some, losing £100 is a disaster, but for others, losing £10,000 might be affordable.
If the Government wants to take a protectionist view, it could insist that punters set their own limits and sign up to impose a “Single Customer View” if they have triggered any markers of harm.
The SCV ensures that punters cannot open multiple accounts across betting operators to circumnavigate the safeguards.
At the moment, the GC is leading its own merry dance that is indirectly taking a wrecking ball to the horse racing industry.
On the one hand it is saying that nothing has changed, and yet the behaviour of its “jackbooted” inspectors is collapsing perfectly legal, morally acceptable gambling on horse racing.
It has been demanding that gambling operators show it the bank statements of big punters, even though there is not necessarily any correlation between losses and affordability. Worse than that, such a blunt-instrument approach is pushing punters into the hands of the black market.
The recently released quarterly results of some of the big betting operators show that the unorthodox approach by GC inspectors has depressed betting on horse racing by at least 15 per cent.
Given that the survival of this industry is intrinsically linked to betting turnover, unless MPs wake up, a lot of rural jobs are at stake.
Rumour has it that Rishi Sunak’s constituents in Yorkshire, where there are a lot of racecourses and trainers’ yards, have been doing a good job of bending his ear over the levy deal between racing and the bookmakers.
As a result, the PM is said to have instructed the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to make sure an additional £20 million is included in the new levy deal by the end of April.
As much as the DCMS will not like this instruction, it is a very poor result for racing. First, the extra money will come from marginally increasing the percentage taken from bookmakers’ profits, but will not take into consideration their profits from foreign racing.
Secondly, this figure should be viewed in the context of an agreement between racing and the Government in 2019, which was going to yield £25 million from foreign racing and £55 million from moving the levy from a percentage of bookmakers’ profits to a percentage of their turnover.
It is hard to get away from the feeling that horse racing has lost the ear and the financial support of Westminster. Perhaps that will be confirmed by the number of MPs present in Westminster Hall next Monday?
There, a key debate on gambling affordability will be judged by just how many MPs actually turn up to listen and contribute. Some already have “prior commitments”.
Their absence will be regrettable because many of them appear to have already been indoctrinated by the Gambling Commission (GC), which has been peddling the questionable concept that “frictionless checks” are the solution to problem gambling.
The technology to carry out these tests, however, does not exist. Checks that betting operators are carrying out at the moment are leaving electronic fingerprints, which will affect future applications for mortgages and financing offers.
The consequences of these checks are anything but frictionless and yet many MPs who will not be attending the debate have been persuaded by the GC into believing they are just that.
Advertisement
The current tests also offer an incomplete financial picture of each gambler that cannot take into account what an acceptable amount to spend on betting is for that individual.
There is now available, however, technology which can protect the three per cent of online gamblers who do have an addiction problem without impacting those who do not.
A number of academic studies have identified “markers of harm”, which can recognise habits that spot problem gamblers.
There are 16 main markers such as deposit behaviour, game selection, frequency of days spent wagering, number of bets per day and bet amounts. There are also 41 other markers which can raise alarms.
So it is well within reason to demand that betting operators use these systems and data to make sure their customers who are likely to have a problem can be identified and protected quickly.
The markers-of-harm approach will work because it can analyse patterns of behaviour rather than taking a blanket approach. After all, for some, losing £100 is a disaster, but for others, losing £10,000 might be affordable.
If the Government wants to take a protectionist view, it could insist that punters set their own limits and sign up to impose a “Single Customer View” if they have triggered any markers of harm.
The SCV ensures that punters cannot open multiple accounts across betting operators to circumnavigate the safeguards.
At the moment, the GC is leading its own merry dance that is indirectly taking a wrecking ball to the horse racing industry.
On the one hand it is saying that nothing has changed, and yet the behaviour of its “jackbooted” inspectors is collapsing perfectly legal, morally acceptable gambling on horse racing.
It has been demanding that gambling operators show it the bank statements of big punters, even though there is not necessarily any correlation between losses and affordability. Worse than that, such a blunt-instrument approach is pushing punters into the hands of the black market.
The recently released quarterly results of some of the big betting operators show that the unorthodox approach by GC inspectors has depressed betting on horse racing by at least 15 per cent.
Given that the survival of this industry is intrinsically linked to betting turnover, unless MPs wake up, a lot of rural jobs are at stake.
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"the extra money will come from marginally increasing the percentage taken from bookmakers’ profits, but will not take into consideration their profits from foreign racing."
And why should it? There's a reasonable case to make that the bookies should be made to support UK racing by paying the Levy to provide the product that underpins their revenue stream on that, but the arrangement they make with French, American (etc) racing to provide betting on their races is a separate matter entirely.
And why should it? There's a reasonable case to make that the bookies should be made to support UK racing by paying the Levy to provide the product that underpins their revenue stream on that, but the arrangement they make with French, American (etc) racing to provide betting on their races is a separate matter entirely.
The expected low turnout of MPs for 4-30pm next Monday doesn't sound good 
Sell sell sell those shares now will be nobody left to bet anything if you cannot get on.
This ship as sailed, the gambling commission is anti gambling and most importantly is anti horse racing they are populated by closet animal rights sympathisers and this is their way of closing horse/dog racing down.
103,345 signatures and only handful of MPs will bother to turn up, might as well scrap them and make it 1 million for a debate.
The problem many campaigners miss is that even if affordability checks are made frictionless or abolished completely it will make no difference because there will still be KYC and AML checks required by law, and cluefulness checks imposed by the bookmakers themselves.
I doubt parliament would want to see any damage being done to British racing,awash with multi millionaire owners and prize crown jewel Royal Ascot. I can see this reptile mob getting kicked into touch…..
No punter no racing threat…….too much at stake for this toilet material mob to win the sleazy intentions….imv
No punter no racing threat…….too much at stake for this toilet material mob to win the sleazy intentions….imv
This news won't help. It has just been announced that Scott Benton MP for Blackpool faces a recall petition and almost certain expulsion after being caught in a sting operation telling undercover reporters he'd be willing to take a bung to ask questions on behalf of bookmakers.
It just reinforces the political smell around betting. It tells ambitious and honest MPs to steer clear.
It just reinforces the political smell around betting. It tells ambitious and honest MPs to steer clear.
They are well tooled up with the mental health issues punter suicidal tendencies nonsense but parliament don’t really care……
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