Bidders Named For Leeds Casino Licence

Five bidders have been named for the licence to run a large casino in Leeds, as permitted by the Gambling Act 2005.
Eight “large” category casinos were permitted by the new regulation. Leeds City Council can award one of these eight casino licences. A large casino will have a minimum area of 1,000 sq m and up to 150 slot machines with a maximum jackpot of £4,000.

Property developer Rushbond’s application is based on turning the former Majestyk nightclub into a casino. The club’s location in City Square would make it a good, central site for a casino.
Leeds United wants to include a casino in its West Stand concourse development. Elland Road does have good transport links but is a little way from the centre of Leeds.
Grosvenor Casinos wants to open a casino on Quarry Hill in central Leeds.
Global Gaming Ventures has submitted plans for a casino in the Eastgate Quarters regeneration project, which is also in the centre of the city.
London Clubs International (LCI) already runs the Alea Casino, on Clarence Dock, and has also applied for the large casino licence. LCI has complained that its existing casino will suffer if the new large casino is awarded to another bidder. It has been claimed that the transport links have not been developed to Clarence Dock and the regeneration project has not been a great success. Certainly the map of Clarence Dock shows a number of empty retail plots.
All the interested bidders have until 24 May 2012 to make representations about the applications.

Surviving and thriving in lean times

It will take OECD countries another 2.7 years to reach the pre-crisis level of economic output, according to the calculations of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). That is on top of the 5 years that have already passed since the beginning of the financial crisis.

So hard times are set to continue. However, some gambling operators are growing even in these difficult times. What strategies are they adopting to survive during these lean times?
The question is especially pertinent to gambling firms operating in Europe. Aside from Germany and some Scandinavian countries, disposable income of European households deteriorated in 2011 and will continue to do so until 2013. 

William Hill, the British betting giant increased revenues in 2011, both in retail and online. William Hill Online (WHO) increased its active players from 1.34m to 1.40m, an increase of 5%. It increased its yield per player from £187 to £228, an increase of 22%, quite a feat considering the steep decline of disposable income in the UK. However, the number of new customers decreased from 808,000 to 790,000 in 2011 and the acquisition cost increased by 43%, from £75 to £108, in line with the increase of the online marketing budget, from £75m to £108m, a 40% increase.
Therefore, WHO made two bets, which it both won. The first bet was that new clients would spend more than their cost of acquisition and the second was that the other clients would increase their spend per capita. 
How did it achieve this?
WHO expanded the methods by which its customers can place bets, investing in mobile sports book and mobile gaming channels. It also innovated a range of its products and broadened in-play betting. For its efforts it can boast a +519% mobile gross win. Another key component to its 2011 success is its strategy to cross promote between its retail arm and its online business and transform its sports bettors into casino, poker and bingo players. The word that defines WHO’s approach is innovation.
Innovation also explains IG Index’s performance. The spread betting firm’s 3Q results show that global revenue increased by 1.5% despite revenue per client declining by 3%. In order to offset the declining spend of clients, IG Index increased the number of its active clients by 4.6%. This strategy is particularly evident in continental Europe, IG Index’s second largest market after the UK. Spend per client in Europe decreased by almost 18% but the number of active clients increased by 26.7%, with the end result that revenue increased by 4.2% for the quarter. 
Contrary to WHO, IG Index did not acquire customers by increasing marketing spend but by investing in its technological platforms. One such platform is Insight, a platform that allows customers to access (at no cost) a wide range of information to help them make a judgement call on their trading. It also automated dealing and payment processes, helping to save costs.
Where WHO and IG Index share strategies is offering customers access through mobile applications. IG rolled out apps for iPhone/iPad, Android, Windows Phone 7 and Blackberry. For the first six months of 2011/2012 financial year, 16% of IG’s revenue came from mobile transactions.
Of course, technological innovation is not limited to the big operators. If anything, smaller firms can be nimbler and more innovative. 
Advant Games, a small Finnish company that offers services to gambling operators just rolled out a product called TiltCtrl. In poker going “on tilt” refers to players playing very aggressively and without consideration for the cards (usually after a bad beat or frustration at losing a hand). It inevitably involves the player losing a large amount of money in a short space of time, which in turn usually leads players to abandon the website to play with a competitor. So what was a short-term gain for the operator in some additional rake becomes a long-term loss of a player. TiltCtrl is a tool that enables operators to identify and prevent tilt in online poker and thereby help retention in a market with high customer turnover.
Some operators, however, attempt to protect their markets by other means. 
Codere decided to combat its competitors by using lawyers. With the excuse that online operators targeting Spain are conducting unfair business practices, it has taken a number of online gambling operators to court. In March 2012 it won a case against Sportingbet and the court forced the online operator to shut down its Miapuesta.es and Miapuesta.com websites. The court ruling was delivered despite the previous Socialist government’s assurances that unlicensed online operators can continue their business until Spain’s gambling regulator started issuing licenses. In spite of the success in court, Codere’s strategy will have a short lifespan as the Spanish online market will open up to competition in any case.
A more valuable approach would be to start emulating the successful strategies adopted by gambling operators in competitive markets.

Adelson Bets Big On Spain

Spain looks to be Sheldon Adelson’s next big bet as the Las Vegas Sands’ (LVS) chairman announced he intends to invest US$35bn (€26.6bn) to build the Eurovegas casino resort. Adelson was speaking at the opening of the US$ 4.4 billion Sands Cotai Central in Macau – one of Adelson’s most successful gambles to date.

One has to wonder from where his confidence comes from for his European venture. Last summer Global Betting and Gaming Consultants published an analysis as to recessions affect the gambling industry and the worst affected segment proved to be casinos.
Europe, and particularly the Eurozone, is currently in the midst of its worst economic crisis since the Depression, and regardless of the outcome of the crisis, the negative effects on European consumers’ disposable income will be felt for years to come.
European casinos are suffering. The four Italian casinos lost 8.4% of revenue in 2011 compared to 2010, with the largest casino, Casino di Venezia, losing 13.2%. In Q1 2012, the four casinos’ revenue continued its fall, down 13.7% compared to the same period of 2011. 

In Greece preliminary results show that for 2011 the nine casinos generated a revenue 18.5% lower than 2010, which itself was the worst year in a decade. Casino attendance also declined by 5.5%.
Groupe Partouche, France’s biggest casino operator, derives 99.7% of its casino revenue from European operations. In 2011 revenue derived from casino gaming declined by 3.2% compared to 2010.
2011 data for Spain’s casino sector are yet to be published but the economic indicators do not indicate a surge of casino gambling. The Spanish central bank expects private consumption to decrease by 1.5% in 2012 and increase between +0% and +0.5% for the next two years. Additionally, unemployment is expected to remain above 20% until at least 2014 and there might be additional tax rises on top of those already announced.
Seeing the state of casinos in most European countries would deter even the most optimistic of investors, but not Adelson. 
The LVS Chairman is also driving a hard bargain with the local, regional and central governments in Spain, who are bending over backwards to accommodate him. Barcelona and Madrid are the two candidate cities eager to house EuroVegas.
With the Spanish economy forecast to shrink in 2012 and 2013 and with unemployment remaining around 22%, the investment is highly attractive to all concerned and Adelson knows that. He provided Spanish authorities with a long list of what he would like if they want LVS to build the huge resort in Spain, including a 10-year gambling tax holiday and an exemption from the smoking ban and labour regulations. 
What initially seemed like excessive demands on Adelson’s part now seems like a well-judged call because the Spanish government is still sitting at the negotiating table.
Even if the Spanish government satisfies most of his wishes, the whole operation is still a huge gamble mainly due to size of the project. LVS intends to build 12 integrated resorts with 12 hotels, three golf courses, six casinos, a stadium and a number of restaurants. Once completed, the resort will have 36,000 rooms and in scale it would be equivalent to half of the Las Vegas Strip. 
Warwick Bartlett, CEO of GBGC, said, “Adelson took a big gamble with both Macau and Singapore and both paid off handsomely.  The investment in Spain is huge although it is over a longer time period but in a difficult European market. LVS must be betting on an eventual European recovery.  The problem with raising the stakes to these levels is that if the investment return doesn’t match the plan you risk everything”.

AGA Repeats Call For Federal E-gaming Regulation

AGA Repeats Call For Federal E-gaming Regulation
By James Rutherford
The American Gaming Association (AGA) recently took the one-year anniversary of the sweeping “Black Friday” crackdown on offshore poker sites by the U.S. Justice Department to once again call on Congress to establish a national framework for regulating online gambling.

As the Washington lobbying arm for the commercial casino industry, the AGA is tasked by its dominant members — Caesars Entertainment, MGM Resorts International, Boyd Gaming, International Game Technology, Bally Technologies, et al. — with trying to secure a legislative solution in the Senate and House of Representatives that serves their best business interests. As the association’s Black Friday anniversary statement reads, this is “to ensure that only licensed, taxed and highly regulated companies” — i.e., its members — “can operate in the U.S”. 

Although nothing about this is simple, the heart of the matter is not all that difficult to grasp:
Ideally, do you get to operate within a uniform system of federal regulation where you can leverage your brand/brands to tap into an interstate pool of poker liquidity valued at upwards of US$7 billion? Or will you have to qualify and re-qualify under any number of disparate state regulatory systems in order to penetrate markets where the political environment is likely to be hostile and you must compete against local operators and government lotteries for US$5 million or US$10 million or US$20 million in wagers, maybe more, maybe less? 
The best the AGA has come up with as a political rationale is consumer protection — to “modernize and strengthen” the Wire Act and UIGEA in ways that will “unambiguously eliminate illegal Internet gambling”. But the association’s chief executive, Frank Fahrenkopf, certainly knows he’s battling a credibility gap. Speaking recently to hundreds of regulators at a Gaming Laboratories International forum in Las Vegas, he acknowledged the opposition to federal regulation among state lotteries. “Their view,” he said, “is that the casino industry is trying to screw them.”
Then there is the multibillion-dollar gambling industry operated by the nation’s Indian tribes to consider. Their claims to sovereign political status under the U.S. Constitution enjoy broad support in the federal courts, something the AGA has been quick to point up. “Tribes are never going to agree that they’ve got to go to a state government to get approval to run something,” 
Fahrenkopf said in his speech to the regulators, “so you have to have the federal government involved to be the agency to work with tribes on licensing and regulation. So you need a federal presence.”
Reasonable as this may seem on the face of it, no one these days would mistake Washington as the capital of reasonableness, and the AGA’s hand there is not a strong one. About the only meaningful card they have to play is Nevada’s own Harry Reid, leader of the Democratic Party’s slim four-seat majority in the Senate. Reid faithfully charges Capitol Hill for federal poker legislation on behalf of his Las Vegas corporate constituents whenever he can. Not that he’s had much to report by way of success so far. It’s not difficult to figure out why. 
Gambling is hardly a vote-getter among the folks back home. Rallying his own party in the Senate behind Internet gambling has been problematic at best. As for securing to the cause a majority of the other 564 members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats, who aren’t from states where casino revenues drive economics and public policy — and in the most partisan, the most polarized political culture in memory — that’s another matter entirely. And Reid has other things to think about, in any case, it being a presidential election year with control of the Senate up for grabs come November.
The consensus is that the AGA’s wishes will have to yield to the greater likelihood of solutions that will vary state by state — a patchwork system of smaller states seeking combinations with other states, the more players the merrier, and larger states fighting to keep the money within their borders — but for now it will be the best of all possible worlds. 
As Goldman Sachs suggested in a recent note to investors: “One state legalizes, we could see a domino impact with other large states accelerating their activity and, more importantly, propelling the U.S. government to create national legislation.”
Nevada, where Internet gambling has been conceptually legal since 2002, is the furthest along. In December 2011, the state Gaming Commission signed off on regulations to allow the licensing and operation of online poker only. In the ideal world envisioned by the AGA’s leading members, Nevada would be the logistical and regulatory headquarters of a vast national poker market. As it stands, they will have to settle for now with the likelihood of intrastate compacts to augment the state’s tiny population. 
Operators began submitting licensing applications in December 2011, and regulators currently expect the first licenses to be granted by early summer 2012. Those operators can be online as soon as their technological platforms are running and the required player controls are in place.
In March 2012, Illinois, one of the states involved in the Justice Department’s December 2011 clarification of the Wire Act, began selling state and multi-state “Mega Millions” lottery tickets online. Adding other games would require legislative approval, but the state believes current sales will prove a significant lure to new players and will raise between US$78 million and US$118 million a year in incremental revenue. 
In New Jersey, Senate Bill 1565 authorizing Atlantic City’s casinos to offer online gambling to state residents has passed the Budget Committee of the upper house and could come to a vote on the floor of the Senate by 31 May 2012 at the earliest. At that point, the bill runs up against crunch time for passage of the state budget, which must be completed by the end of the financial year on 30 June 2012. SB1565 also has to be reconciled with the preferences of the state Assembly, which also must pass it for it to be presented to Gov. Chris Christie to be signed into law. The timing for possible action in the Assembly was uncertain as of this writing. The good news is that after being vetoed by Christie last year, 2012’s effort has largely been crafted with input from the governor, and it is expected he will approve the legislation when it arrives on his desk.
California is the big prize. The state with the largest population, the most lucrative liquidity prospects, and the most varied and complex interests to accommodate, if online gambling can be enacted there, it is believed the rest of the country will be quick to tumble. The historical record, though, offers nothing but a trail of failed attempts. 
Senate Bill 1463, introduced in February 2012 by Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, a Sacramento Democrat, and Los Angeles County Democrat Roderick Wright, authorizes 10-year licenses for the state’s tribal casinos, card clubs and horse racing interests, about 150 entities in all, to offer online poker, with other games possible after a two-year evaluation period. It’s a deeply divided group, however, and feuding has been intense over who should get licenses and who shouldn’t. Many in the industry also want the state to do more to keep license holders with few resources from acting as fronts for wealthier out-of-state entities, such as Las Vegas casinos.
If these issues can be resolved, it is expected that only a handful of well-funded, well-marketed websites will go live, given the significant barrier to entry posed by SB1463’s US$30 million license fee (although this would be credited against the bill’s proposed 10 percent tax on gross revenue), and it’s likely that groups of license-holders will combine as joint-venture operators.
The size of the prize in relation to e-gaming in the US is not in doubt. But it is because the rewards are potentially so great that all vested interests want to position themselves to gain their share of the spoils, starting with governments both state and federal. Political machinations, greed, and indecision in some quarters as to what they actually do want, could see another opportunity missed in the coming year before the presidential elections.

Casino Surge Sees Macau Close In On Japan

Macau, the special administrative region of China in the South China Sea measuring just 30 square kilometres, became the world’s 3rd largest gambling jurisdiction in 2010, according to research for GBGC’s new, seventh edition of its market leading Global Gambling Report.
Macau leapt into 3rd place with total gambling revenues of US$ 23.83 billion in 2010, ahead of Italy and the UK. Only the US and Japan now lie in front of Macau in the rankings. Macau’s casino gaming revenues rose by 42% to US$ 33.40 billion in 2011 and it is closing in fast on Japan in second place. Macau’s gaming sector is showing no signs of slowing in 2012 and revenues are up 27% in the first quarter of the year.

GBGC Top 5 Gambling Markets

GBGC Top 5 Gambling Markets


These top 5 markets accounted for 53% of all global gambling revenues.
“After a slowdown in 2009, the performance of Macau’s casinos has been remarkable in 2010 and 2011. Macau entered the top 5 in 2010 and if its growth continues at a similar pace for the next few years it is not inconceivable it could take second place from Japan. Of course, if Japan finally permits integrated casino resorts this will help boost its gambling revenues and keep it ahead of Macau,” explained GBGC’s Director Lorien Pilling.
GBGC Macau Casino Revenues

GBGC Macau Casino Revenues


April 2012 saw Sands China open the latest stage of its development on Macau’s Cotai Strip. Costing some US$ 5 billion on completion, Sands Cotai Central is adding 5,800 new hotel rooms to Macau and more than one million square feet of retail, entertainment and dining space.
The completion of Sands Cotai Central follows on from nearby Galaxy Macau’s opening last year, as the Cotai Strip, which not too many years ago was under water and swamp, becomes the battleground between casino operators for market share in Macau.
 
Global Gambling Report 7th Edition Available Now
The 7th edition of GBGC’s Global Gambling Report Against The Odds is available for purchase now.
The latest edition of the Global Gambling Report continues to provide a comprehensive assessment of the gambling activities in markets around the world.
The report contains more than 250 individual country reports detailing gambling regulation, gambling data, and news about gambling operators and activities. These country reports cover markets on every continent.
In addition the Global Gambling Report includes extensive data for all gambling activities.
New for the 7th edition of the report there are now full global appendices for 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010.
Global Betting and Gaming Consultants’ unrivalled Key Markets Database contains a sequence of gambling revenues from 2001 with forecasts to 2015.
This database covers 86% of global revenues and includes all gambling categories: horseracing, betting, casino, native American gaming, machines, lotteries, and bingo. More details here.
Global Betting and Gaming Consultants’ Director Lorien Pilling explained, “The title for the current edition, Against The Odds, reflects how the new economic era has caused certain governments to change their stance on gambling as finances become tight. They see gambling as a new source of revenues and, as a result, we are seeing gambling – or additional forms of gambling – being permitted in some surprising markets. Against all the odds, gambling is expanding.”
The specialist Global Gambling Report is essential reading for gambling executives.
Available either as part of GBGC’s Platinum Subscription or as a one-off report.
 

A Night On The Tiles – Growth Of Mah-jong

For all the fuss that is made about the popularity of internet poker and the boom in online bingo, the game that is quietly creeping up on them both is one that involves kongs, pongs, and chows – mah-jong. With an estimated 700 million players worldwide this game of tiles is one that e-gaming operators cannot afford to ignore.

Of course, the majority of these players are based in Asia, with an estimated 500 million in China alone. Mah-jong became China’s 255th sport recognised by the country’s General Administration of Sports of China back in 1998 and the China State Sports Commission published China’s first official set of rules for the game. 

Speaking to Jonas Alm, chief executive of Mahjong Logic, the Isle of Man-licensed mah-jong software specialist, he told Global Betting and Gaming Consultants that Japan is also a particularly good market for online mah-jong. There are some 10,000 mah-jong parlours in Japan, as well as a professional mah-jong league. These factors are combined with the fact that it is easier to conduct business online in Japan (in terms of payments etc) than mainland China.
But there are sizeable mah-jong playing populations across the world. Mahjong Logic estimates a mah-jong playing population of 3 million people across Europe and a similar figure for the US, where there are 350,000 members in the National Mah Jongg League (NMJL) (founded 1937). 
In the UK, Mahjong Logic has recently signed a deal with the Hippodrome Casino, which is shortly to open in London’s Leicester Square, near the capital’s China Town.
Explaining the reasoning behind the deal, the Hippodrome’s George Constantinou said, “The Hippodrome Casino will have a large percentage of Chinese and Asian players who all know and love the game of mah-jong. Partnering with Mahjong Logic allows us to immediately offer online mah-jong to our customer base and leverage their already existing player liquidity pool”.
Online mah-jong works to the same business model as online poker. The game’s operator takes a rake from the amount wagered on the game. In the same way as poker, therefore, a successful peer-to-peer online mah-jong network also depends on player liquidity. 
Mahjong Logic states that the ‘average’ mah-jong player lives in Asia, is male, and 29 years old. The ratio of male to female players is 82:18 and 88% of players are aged between 18 and 45 years.
Mah-jong is permitted in the casinos of Macau but the revenues derived from the game are negligible compared to baccarat. In 2011 mah-jong revenues in Macau were just MOP 70 million (US$ 8.75 million), although this was an increase of 105% on the previous year. 
One of the complications of offering online mah-jong is that there are numerous variations of the rules and scoring systems in different regions and countries including: Chinese classical mah-jong, Hong Kong mah-jong, Sichuan mah-jong, and American mah-jong.
A major benefit that mah-jong does have, however, is that is often considered to be a sports or game of skill. This means it is more accepted by governments as a “cultural norm” rather than being seen as “gambling”, although wagering is an integral component of the game for most players.
Asia is where the future of gambling lies, both in the online and land-based spheres. It is a region for which e-gaming operators have to develop a strategy. Mah-jong, with its cultural history and popularity, is a game that has to be in an operator’s plans as they seek to diversify into new games and new markets.

Global Gambling Report 7th Edition Available Now

The 7th edition of GBGC’s Global Gambling Report Against The Odds is available for purchase now.
The latest edition of the Global Gambling Report continues to provide a comprehensive assessment of the gambling activities in markets around the world.

The report contains more than 250 individual country reports detailing gambling regulation, gambling data, and news about gambling operators and activities. These country reports cover markets on every continent.
In addition the Global Gambling Report includes extensive data for all gambling activities. 


New for the 7th edition of the report there are now full global appendices for 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010.
Global Betting and Gaming Consultants’ unrivalled Key Markets Database contains a sequence of gambling revenues from 2001 with forecasts to 2015.
This database covers 86% of global revenues and includes all gambling categories: horseracing, betting, casino, native American gaming, machines, lotteries, and bingo. 
More details here
Global Betting and Gaming Consultants’ Director Lorien Pilling explained, “The title for the current edition, Against The Odds, reflects how the new economic era has caused certain governments to change their stance on gambling as finances become tight. They see gambling as a new source of revenues and, as a result, we are seeing gambling – or additional forms of gambling – being permitted in some surprising markets. Against all the odds, gambling is expanding.”
The specialist Global Gambling Report is essential reading for gambling executives.
Available either as part of GBGC’s Platinum Subscription or as a one-off report. 
Buy now

UK Remote Gambling Consultation Opens

In the Budget 2012 given by the Chancellor in March it was announced that the government would move to taxing remote gambling on a place of consumption basis. This announcement came after the completion of the Treasury’s review of the taxation of remote gambling in autumn 2011.

The consultation into the issue opened on 5 April 2012. It will close on 28 June 2012.
Details of the consultation can be found here:
http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/consult_tax_remote_gambling_consumption_basis.htm 

The consultation is “seeking views on design characteristics of the planned changes to remote gambling taxation”.
In the foreword to the consultation Chloe Smith, Economic Secretary to the Treasury states:
“The popularity of remote gambling has grown and continues to grow significantly. However, despite the UK’s sizeable market, strong history of being a leader in gambling provision, and highly reputable regulatory environment, gambling operators face strong incentives to supply to the UK from outside the UK duty regime. Today, only approximately 10 per cent of remote gambling carried out by customers in the UK is subject to UK gambling duties. In addition, an increasing number of other European countries have moved to taxing remote gambling on a place of consumption basis. These developments mean that the current remote gambling taxation regime is no longer appropriate and requires modernisation.
At Budget 2012, the Government announced that it would move to taxing remote gambling on a place of consumption basis. This announcement followed the Treasury’s review of the taxation of remote gambling in autumn 2011. Under a place of consumption basis of taxation, an operator will pay tax on gross gambling profits generated from customers in the UK, no matter where in the world the operator itself is located.
A place of consumption basis of taxation for remote gambling will level the playing field, providing a fairer basis for competition between remote gambling supplied from the UK and overseas.
The reformed remote gambling tax regime will also improve the sustainability of the UK’s tax base by ensuring that remote gambling, alongside other gambling products, makes a fair contribution to public finances. A place of consumption basis of taxation will bring additional public revenues from operators based abroad who supply remote gambling to the UK.”

GBGC Global Gambling Report Updates March 2012

GBGC Global Gambling Report Updates
March 2012
This month’s updates also include the launch of the 7th edition of the Global Gambling Report – Against The Odds.

GBGC’s Platinum Subscribers will automatically have access to the new edition through the online subscription service. 

As well as the updates to the country report this month has also seen the addition of: 
•    Full global gambling appendices for 2009 and 2010 
•    Updated gambling forecasts until 2015 
•    A new “at a glance” spreadsheet” of operators by category for each jurisdiction 
•    Gambling spend per capita for 2010 
•    More photos of gambling outlets and venues 

Updates include: 
UK: details of the new Machine Games Duty announced in the Budget 2012, proposed changes to Internet gambling regulation, and the ongoing dispute between the Health Lottery and Camelot.
Alderney: findings of independent review into the Full Tilt saga
Sweden, Norway, Finland et al: details of the launch of the new multi-jackpot Eurojackpot lottery game
Isle of Man: amendment to the regulation now permitting the streaming of live casino games for use in Internet gambling
Malta: winner of the national lottery concession
Croatia: new 2011 data added for betting, casinos, and machines
France: preliminary data for 2011
Netherlands: launch of new lottery
Italy: poor performance of horseracing and sports betting, operators fined
Greece: revenue declines for Greek casinos and OPAP
Australia: Crown undertaking a refurbishment plan, pokie plan pushed back to 2016 by Government
Northern Mariana Islands: the faltering start for the new Rota casino
Caribbean: new jurisdiction reports added for Martinique, St Barthelemy, St Maarten and Saint Martin.
India: increase in casino fees
Singapore: approval of the first junket operators for the Resorts World casino
South Africa: 2011 casino revenues by state

Betting Shops Avoid Portas Proposals For Now

The UK’s high street betting shops have avoided (for now, at least) changes to planning laws that would have seen them subject to a new, separate “use class”. The idea was one of a number of proposals put forward by retail marketing consultant Mary Portas in a government-commission report to revitalise the UK high street.

The introduction of a new “use class” would have made it simpler for local authorities to block or reject planning applications for new betting shops. It was intended that such a move would help reduce the supposed “clustering” of betting shops on the high street in certain areas.
But Grant Shapps, Minister for Housing and Local Government, stated at the end of March 2012 that the proposal relating to betting shops had been delayed for now and subject to a further review. 

GBGC has written previously about the attack on high street betting shops and the important role they play on in providing retail jobs at a time when many shops are closing and standing empty.
Writing in MoneyWeek (Issue 582 30 March 2012) Matthew Lynn offers a forthright opinion for the future of the high street (Allow the high street a dignified death).
He argues: “As more and more shops close down, we can expect plenty of calls for help. The government will be launching enquiries and lobbyists will be arguing for tax breaks and subsidies to keep shops alive. It’s all nonsense. In fact, the high street should be allowed to die a quick and dignified death”.
“There is no worse policy than trying to keep alive a structurally dying industry…Now it’s time for the traditional British high street to be allowed to die”. 
In its place Lynn proposes the following:
“Most town centres were originally a mix of residential, light industrial, commercial and retail space…The best response would be to relax planning laws. As shops shut down, turn the buildings into offices, small factories and workshops, and most of all houses.”
This vision of the new British high street with a mix of premises types would be ideal for betting shops. It would hark back to a time when bookmakers would take bets at the factory gates and when workers would visit the betting shop in their lunch hour before the afternoon’s racing.
The British betting shop has shown its resilience over the decades in the face of the changing nature of the high street, although large numbers have closed since the 1970s . 
Betting shops have adapted their gambling activities to reflect changing consumer interest, as regulations allow. With the introduction of Machine Games Duty, the threat of possible changes to planning laws not entirely removed, ongoing competition from the Internet, and further upheaval in the UK high street, betting shops will have to continue to adapt to survive.

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