Examination of Witnesses (Questions 960
- 979)
TUESDAY 27 JANUARY 2004
MR NICK
HARDING, MR
ANTHONY BRENNER
AND DR
MARTIN RAWLINGS
Q960 Lord Wade of Chorlton: Particularly
to Dr Rawlings, why do you think that statutory national guidance
needs to be developed to cover conditions in machine licences
and the determination of machine numbers? Can this not be left
to local authorities to judge?
Dr Rawlings: A comment I would
make on this, as I said earlier, is that the numbers have been
left to the discretion of magistrates now and it really does not
work. Some years ago, it has changed a bit now, if you went to
Sheffield it did not matter what business you had you were only
allowed one machine because that was their policy, but if you
went over the border you could have two or more. If you are going
to have a national system to regulate, it seems that there must
be a sensible reason to have two machines or more. It does not
seem too difficult to us to actually decide what that guidance
might be. What you are saying is that the nature of that premises
is somewhat different to what one would regard as a pub therefore
you can make the case out for having four machines or not. Without
that guidance how do you know, how do you plan for a business
to say, "I am going to refurbish that pub but I do not know
how many machines I am going to get before I get there."
That is not very helpful.
Q961 Lord Wade of Chorlton: Do you
not think it is appropriate for particular communities to be able
to decide through their local authority the sort of standards
and ranges and quality and services they may require, which could
differ from one community to another?
Dr Rawlings: I think in general
terms I would agree with that principle and say this Bill will
be tagged on to the Licensing Act and do just that. I think it
is a question of where you draw the lines in the sand. If you
say this is what you have as of right, what you allow for is local
objections if things go wrong, and it would be quite reasonable
if local residents were upset because they saw streams of young
kids going into pubs that they could do something about it. That
is quite right. But I do not see that local residents would even
have a view, frankly, as to whether you should have three or four
machines in a particular pub. Why would they? Our research shows
that people are not bothered by them.
Q962 Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville:
The foreign witnesses who appeared before us immediately before
yourselves emphasised how important good regulation was to the
health of the industry. In the case of the Licensing Bill it is
not only the guidance that has not arrived, there continues to
be angst among local authorities about whether they are going
to be able to cover their expenses in terms of their responsibilities
within the Licensing Bill. How serious is it from the point of
view of the members of your associations if in fact local authority
licensing capability is diminished because they cannot get their
expenses covered?
Dr Rawlings: It is very important.
It is debatable how much money that is, as you know, but I think
we certainly need to know what the cost is going to be before
we go through this Bill and the local authorities I am sure will
be desperate to know, one, how much they are going to get to do
and, two, how much money they are going to get to do it, absolutely.
Chairman: We have got the Local Government
Association on Thursday so we will see what they have to say.
Q963 Lord Walpole: I was just wondering
whether Dr Rawlings thinks that the local authorities are going
to be able to cope anyway because they have been given so many
extra things to do.
Dr Rawlings: As the Chairman says,
they can answer for themselves and perhaps I should not.
Chairman: Thank you for that.
Q964 Baroness Golding: In the submissions
we have had from BBPA and AGC you have argued for the maximum
stake and prize levels for machines to be increased and for Category
B, C and D machines to be able to be linked within premises. Could
you explain these requests and why do you think it would be helpful
to your members? How would it work?
Dr Rawlings: Just to make it clear
that we are certainly not looking for linking the machines in
pubs, that is the first thing I should make clear. I go back to
my earlier answer, we have argued consistently for a prize level
of £50 since 1997 and the reason for that date is the Gaming
Board asked us and everybody at that time to take a look into
the future and have a vision of the future of where we thought
machines should go, in our case where they should go in pubs in
terms of stakes and prizes. We did research at that time with
MORI which we repeated for the following review and what we discovered
was our customers' expectation of prizes on machines was 70 pounds
(at that time it was £10) and we said to the Gaming Board
that seems to be a reasonable expectation. We wanted to move to
over £50 over three triennial reviews. That is a cautious
approach to increasing the stakes and prizes to what people were
expecting them to be in the market. One of the things then was
the introduction of the National Lottery and everyone would agree
that had an effect on the market. We argued that we thought it
right to tell the Committee in submitting our evidence here that
is what we think should happen.
Q965 Baroness Golding: That is not
linking the machines?
Dr Rawlings: Not linking the
machines.
Mr Harding: That was our submission.
First of all, we feel that £50 prizes would be more appropriate.
We see ourselves, the adult gaming centres, as providing for a
female audience whilst betting offices provide for a male audience
on the high street. LBOs, betting offices have a £500 prize
and we would like a £50 prize starting at even a tenth of
what they are paying out. In addition, an LBO has a number of
different products in betting sport and we have a very homogenous
product with a limited stock. We feel if we could link some of
the machines together within a small unit it would provide something
more interesting for some of the customers. We have seen manufacturers
over the last couple of years provide games where you have four
or five machines linked together anyway and we would like to extend
that.
Q966 Baroness Golding: How many machines
would you think of being linked together and what kind of premises?
Mr Harding: I think a ratio, if
the top prize becomes £500 for four machines in an adult
gaming centre, and the rest of the machines can pay out at the
moment £25 or £50, possibly multiplying ten times £50
to have a £500 prize for all the people linked in one game.
We find that it introduces an element of competition. They all
sit down together and it is quite a social thing.
Q967 Lord Wade of Chorlton: May I
just ask how easy is it for an under-age gambler to get into your
facilities?
Mr Harding: The companies that
I represent have licences under Section 34 of the Gaming Act which
means under-18s are precluded from playing machines, which means
we are breaking the law if they come in. We regard it as gross
misconduct certainly if a member of staff knowingly allows somebody
under 18 to play a machine they are dismissed. We have a CitizenCard
which means if somebody is borderline they are sent away with
a CitizenCard to fill in and told to bring it back when it is
validated.
Q968 Lord Wade of Chorlton: Are you
satisfied that it is pretty well controlled?
Mr Harding: Absolutely, no question.
Q969 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
Could I ask Dr Rawlings you said very strongly a few minutes ago
that you had no interest in your machines in pubs being played
by under-18s. How do you intend to operate within the provisions
of the Licensing Act which permits children to come into pubs,
presumably into areas where there are machines, unless you are
proposing to segregate machines from children?
Dr Rawlings: We are certainly
not proposing to segregate machines. I have to say that would
send out exactly the wrong message to what we would regard as
low risk usage anyway. A pub by its nature has a number of products
in there which are age-related not least of which is alcohol.
We have many children coming into pubs and it is very clear the
law say you do not sell alcohol to under 18s. We certainly support
age cards and we are a member of the PASS scheme which helped
nationalise that scheme. It is a question of management more than
anything else. Our members argue that you manage a pub by walking
about, you do not manage it by hiding away and you do not manage
it by having green lines on the floors or barriers around machines
or sticking them into a separate area, all of which I think are
laughable ways of dealing with the problem, if there is a problem.
I have to say I do not think there is a problem at all but if
there is we certainly believe we can control it. All we are saying
is why does the Government not reinforce that with the law because
that is the best deterrent that anybody knows?
Q970 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
Can I ask Mr Brenner, you cater for children on your pier, I am
sure, until you sell it. What do you say to the evidence that
we have been gathering (and a lot of insistent evidence) from
different people which is along the lines of the earlier you start
gambling the more problems you have when you become an adult?
Mr Brenner: We do not hold with
that.
Chairman: Perhaps you would like to come
back in a moment.
Q971 Baroness Golding: I was delighted
with what you said about proof of age cards. I chair the CitizenCard
so I know quite a bit about the work they have been doing. Could
I ask about the number of Category A machines in large casinos.
Do you think they should be limited?
Mr Harding: Absolutely. I find
it really difficult to understand why it should be suggested there
should be a ratio of three to one until you get to 40 tables and
it suddenly becomes unlimited. The man on the Clapham omnibus,
as they say, would struggle with that. I honestly do not see how
any casino is going to be built with 30 tables. They are all going
to have 41 tables and have unlimited machines. I think there should
be a ratio of three to one and it should continue through and
whether you have ten tables or 60 tables, it should not matter
Q972 Chairman: Should any casino
have unlimited jackpot machines? I do not know if you heard the
evidence we had earlier about 100,000 square feet of games with
2,000 or 3,000 machines.
Dr Rawlings: We do not see how
you can regulate something if you do not have a regulation and
if it is unlimited there is no regulation. If we are talking about
proliferation, we are here talking about two £25 machines
in public houses and we are talking about 2,000 or 3,000 unlimited
machines in a casino. Surely, there needs to be some regulation
on it?
Q973 Chairman: Did you find your
answer?
Mr Brenner: I would agree with
that. I think that regulation is absolutely imperative. We have
provided at the seaside and theme parks and amusement parks the
form of entertainment that we are currently running for the past
40 years or more, the life of the existing Bill, without any hard
evidence that problems have been caused to the absolute millions
of families who have patronised our operations over those years.
Chairman: Thank you for that. Social
implications, Lord Donoughue?
Q974 Lord Donoughue of Ashton: Can
I ask you a question on addiction, whether pathological or problem
gambling. Earlier one of our witnesses, an American witness, was
quite reassuring from his particular position in the industry
in his references to the relationship between machine gambling
and problem gambling, but Professor Orford has told the Committee
that "first year psychology undergraduates learning the laws
of how people will acquire habits which are difficult to break
are often shown a picture of a gambling machine because it is
an almost perfect mechanism for creating a habit which is difficult
to break." Do you agree with the view that gaming machines
are "inherently"—this is another quote—"more
addictive than other forms of gambling" and what are you
all doing to address that problem?
Mr Harding: Anyone who is being
honest would admit that machines are potentially addictive. That
is the absolute bottom line. The degree of addiction and the harm
it can cause is totally dependent on the prizes offered and the
stakes. The prevalence study we have done has shown that with
the low stake and prize levels we have in the United Kingdom currently
the number of people harmed by them is relatively low but we are
mindful of that number. Certainly AGCs have been in the vanguard
of support for GamCare for a number of years long before the GICT
was ever thought of. Our staff follow the "Back to GamCare"
regime in terms of social responsibility training. I would say
to you that is something which is relatively easy to do in the
small, fairly intimate businesses that we have where there may
be 40 or 50 machines in one location, and I think it becomes infinitely
harder if you have an awful lot of machines in the same place
to provide support for. We have customers who have problems. I
cannot sit here and say we do not. We do what we can when that
happens to direct them to GamCare and counselling. We offer self-exclusion
notices, which means someone fills in a form which says "I
do not want to be allowed back in here for six months" and
that is adhered to quite vigorously. I think it would be harder
to do that with larger numbers of machines.
Dr Rawlings: Can I quote directly
from the prevalence study that was referred to earlier, which
says that the casino gambling prevalence rate is eight per cent
and fruit machines are three point four per cent, which puts it
in sixth place in terms of incidence of prevalence of gambling.
So I am not sure your premise is right. I certainly agree with
Nick that there is a problem with everything in terms of gambling
otherwise we would not be discussing it, but in the scheme of
addiction activity, horse racing, casinos, dog racing and private
betting all score higher than fruit machines.
Q975 Lord Donoughue of Ashton: Bearing
in mind the consequences of mixing alcohol and gambling and the
fact that in 2002 30 per cent of calls on machine gambling to
the GamCare helpline cited playing in pubs and clubs, what measures
should be taken to protect the vulnerable and how can they be
enforced?
Dr Rawlings: I am glad that question
was asked. We certainly saw that figure in evidence previously.
I have to say GamCare themselves have been very helpful to us
in assisting in answering this question. I understand that the
2003 figures are going to be published today and they have given
us pre-notice of those. In 2001 the call number was 19 per cent
and this last year in 2003 it was 21 per cent. Why and whether
it went up to 30 per cent last year we do not have a good answer
to, perhaps there is more information on that and that may be
so. I would say the total number of calls here is less than 900
a year and if you look at that, 20 per cent of something like
1,000 is 200 calls a year. I should just mention that figure is
pubs and clubs we are talking about and there are some 20,000
clubs. So we are talking about 80,000 venues and 200 people made
a call to the helpline. From our point of view that is a needle
in a haystack as to whether problem gamblers can be found.
Q976 Lord Mancroft: Am I right in
thinking that 30 per cent of machines are sited in pubs so that
30 per cent of calls would be logical?
Dr Rawlings: We think if you look
at GamCare figures they will certainly show you that in the past
betting shops had an absolute lower percentage of call rate than
do pubs, but only 2 per cent of people play machines in betting
shops and 15 per cent play them in pubs.
Q977 Jeff Ennis: The Government's
policy of "destination" rather than "casual"
gambling is an important part of its strategy for restricting
levels of problem gambling. How can the provision of gaming machines
in pubs be justified in this context?
Dr Rawlings: I think this is why
I would have to disagree with the Government here. I am not sure
we understand what destination gambling is but if what we understand
by it is that people have to specifically get up and go gambling
I am not sure that is a good thing. Social gambling the Secretary
of State says is a good thing. Social gambling includes the National
Lottery. You can go out into every high street town centre and
shop and buy a Lottery ticket or a scratch card for a £1
and nobody says that is a bad thing. We do not think playing a
low prize machine in a pub is any different. It is socially acceptable.
We do not have a problem, except those people generally against
gambling altogether, with our machines and our research with MORI
shows us that, so what is wrong with social gambling? We think
it is a better thing to do rather than hide it away and give it
a mystique that would make it more attractive, certainly more
attractive to younger people. By making it open I do not think
we have much of a problem.
Mr Harding: We feel that the last
prevalence study was very useful but it was based on statistics
from 1998. We think that one of the things that ought to be done
is that a new prevalence study is conducted because so much has
changed in the last five years. We have FOBTs; we have remote
gambling; we have the onset of gambling using a mobile handset.
I do not think we really have a proper grasp of the gambling landscape
at the moment.
Q978 Mr Page: There was a little
talk of support for GamCare. Could I ask how much your members
contribute to GICT and to GamCare and the mechanism as to how
such money is collected? Secondly, do you think that the organisations
that will gain from this legislation ought to pay more?
Mr Brenner: "Certainly"
is the word that comes to mind. A lot of our members who operate
machines are members of BACTA as well as BALPPA. We contribute
mainly through BALPPA and BACTA and use their scale. Others who
contribute do it to recognise social responsibility and they contribute
accordingly. That is not to say that they believe their assumptions
cause a problem.
Dr Rawlings: Last year, our Association
collected very nearly £100,000 as a contribution to the charitable
trust from our members. Some of our non-members also contributed
to that. We would like to put on record that we do not believe
that anybody should be able to buy legislation. We are concerned
that the trust and GamCare are being used in that way. If the
Bill is right for the country, the Bill is right, irrespective
of who contributes what. What is important here is that the charities
themselves receive the money that they need to exist and to run
those businesses to help people with problem gambling. We have
always supported GamCare, for many years. Before this arose, we
were contributing as an industry around 20,000 a year. We recognised
firstly that it was difficult for GamCare operators to raise money
for problem gambling because it is not exactly a top line public
conscious charity, so it is right that the industry looks to itself
to make sure they have that funding. We did see the charitable
trust as a way of securing regular funding for those industries.
If there is undue pressure on that trust to spend its money other
than on treating people with problem gambling—I am referring
to suggestions that maybe the trust should pay for the prevalence
studies—I think that money should go directly to the best
charities that are around to help people. We would reserve the
right to put our money directly into those charities if we felt
that was in danger.
Mr Harding: The companies I represent
contribute to the GICT through BACTA. They contributed something
like 30 per cent funding through the BACTA funding last year.
I have to declare an interest here in as much as I am a trustee
of the GICT. Philosophically as a trustee, I have an issue with
the suggestion that we should raise more money in order to pay
for the problems that we are going to create. The money that the
trust has should be there to look after people with problem gambling
now and the idea that it should be used to buy legislation is
not acceptable to me.
Q979 Mr Page: I am a great believer
in strong trade associations. Do your trade associations have
all the market or are there members who are outside your trade
association which make no contribution? What is the percentage?
Dr Rawlings: Of 60,000 pubs we
probably represent somewhere around 36,000. It varies between
35,000 and 40,000, depending on who owns who this week.
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