Betting, Gaming and Lotteries

We cannot underestimate the shock, anger and disappointment in Blackpool when the casino advisory panel made its announcement. That anger has not dissipated since the announcement was made—just the opposite. The people of Blackpool are determined to fight for their future, and my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) and I are determined to fight within this Chamber for their future. On Monday, we accompanied the editor of our evening paper, The Gazette, to bring down and present to No. 10 a petition signed by more than 11,500 people. That shows the strength of feeling. That strength of feeling has existed for a long time. Blackpoolers have been involved in this debate for seven years. This was our future. This was the new 21st century Blackpool. The people of Blackpool are wonderfully innovative. We put the tower up in the 19th century and developed the pleasure beach and lots of other attractions in the 20th century. Let us remember that what we are talking about is a huge entertainment complex including a conference centre, hotels, restaurants, theatres—everything. This was the big idea for the 21st century and I say to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that we are not giving up on it—and we are certainly not giving up easily. We are going to argue the case until the end of this debate and beyond, as she well knows. I want to set the record straight about what we, as Blackpool MPs, have been asking for. My right hon. Friend said at the beginning of her address that it would have been wrong for her to present an order in which she had taken out ““Manchester”” and inserted ““Blackpool””. We have never asked for that. We asked for two orders so that the eight large and eight small casinos could be considered separately from the other casino. I say to colleagues in the Chamber whose constituencies have been allocated a large or a small casino, I want them to get them. It is not my fault that we are voting for the whole lot—I am in the position that I am in. I want Great Yarmouth to get its large casino, which I am sure will be hugely successful for the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Mr. Wright), and I do not want to vote down Manchester. I want the debate on the regional casino to be properly considered. I tabled my early-day motion, which was supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South and Opposition Members representing neighbouring seats on the Fylde coast, because this affects not only Blackpool but all of us, given the regeneration potential of the super-casino. I have to say that it seems absurd to talk about a regional casino when there is only to be one. If the Secretary of State will forgive me, I will call it a super-casino, because that is what it is. I was a member of the Standing Committee that considered the Bill that became the Gambling Act 2005. I can see no relationship between the casino advisory panel’s report and what we debated in Committee. I must acknowledge the excellent work of my right hon. Friend the Minister for Sport on that Committee. When we debated the new casinos, we expressed concern about the proliferation of gambling and the problems that that might bring. However, we also discussed the regeneration potential of casinos. Many hon. Members on both sides of the House backed the Bill only because of its regeneration potential for disadvantaged communities. I will put it even more strongly: they backed the Bill only because a debate had started on the regeneration of our seaside resorts, which, as we all know, have suffered over the past 20 years due to changing patterns of holidaymaking. When we considered setting up the casino advisory panel during our consideration of the Bill, I supported it—I can say that quite honestly. However, I supported it in the context of the criteria we were considering: eight regional casinos, eight large casinos and eight small casinos. Things changed when the number of regional casinos went down to one. The panel should have been given further guidance on how to examine that new super-casino. It was not the panel’s fault that it had to examine a range of criteria as part of its task. How could it determine what was Parliament’s priority if the Government did not state what the priority was? When we debated the spread of casinos that would allow the impact of gambling to be properly assessed, we talked about having a spread of geographical locations for each of the categories. However, as soon as there was to be only one regional casino, we could not say, ““We’ll have part of it in a city, part in a resort and part in the middle of the countryside.”” Professor Crow had to try to make sense of the complex remit that he was given, so I cannot blame him for coming up with what he thought was the right answer. However, I can question whether, even within the rules that were set—by and large he set them for himself—he came up with the right answer. My early-day motion, which was supported by many colleagues, highlighted the fact that we needed a proper investigation before we made a decision on the single regional casino. That did not happen. I congratulate the Merits Committee in the other place because, in a short time, it has highlighted serious deficiencies in the casino advisory panel’s report. If we in this House had had the opportunity to set up a Committee to consider the report, we could have highlighted other matters that could and should have been properly discussed. Nevertheless, I have to accept that that scrutiny was not performed, except by the Merits Committee, and we should address some of the points that it made. I make no apologies for repeating some of the points that other hon. Members have made, because they are very important. How did the panel address the need to minimise harm? It said that"““maximising beneficial social impact…whilst minimising adverse social impact””" was implicit in its criteria, but it should have been explicit, because that was the concern of so many hon. Members. If it had been explicit, the panel would have looked much closer at destination casinos. In various international analyses, destination casinos have been found to minimise social impact and maximise the benefits. When I go away on holiday, I take some money to spend, I spend it and I come home. If someone goes to Las Vegas to gamble, they will take spending money for that purpose. They will lose the money, but then they will come home and get on with their lives. All the evidence shows that the system would work best with a proper destination casino. Sadly, Professor Crow, in his evidence to the Merits Committee, said that it was virtually impossible for a resort to be allocated the regional casino because of the criteria within which he was operating. He ruled it out without ever properly considering our case.