Government-imposed cuts to the amount of money gamblers can stake on betting machines has led to a near-40% reduction in police callouts to bookies to deal with customers becoming violent after losing money.
Police callouts fell by 38% following a legislation last year slashing the highest possible bet on fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) from £100 every 20 seconds to just £2, the Guardian can reveal. There were 1,803 police callouts in 2019, compared with 2,907, even though the reduced stake rules only took effect three months into the year.
The figure, obtained under Freedom of Information law, show there were also 23% fewer incidents requiring a police presence than in 2017 and less than half of the 4,060 reported in 2016. All of the figures exclude data from one unnamed bookmaker, which used the wrong methodology.
MPs and campaigners involved in the successful effort to reduce maximum stakes on FOBTs said the apparent reduced strain on police resources vindicated efforts to curb the machines.
Former sports minister Tracey Crouch, whose resignation forced the government to abandon a plan to delay the stake cut, said the data indicated better protection for gamblers and shop staff, as well as a reduced cost to the public purse.
“The direct impact of the FOBT stake cut was always going to be about the reduction of harm to the individual gambler,” she said. “But I knew from the number of police officers and bookmaker employees who contacted me telling tales of violence towards them and the machines that it would have an indirect impact too. These figures obtained by the Guardian prove that.”
The Gambling Commission said the stakes cut was not the only factor in the reduction in police callouts, pointing to improved links between shops and the police, falling overall crime rates and a broader fall in the number of betting shops.
But while the number of bookmakers’ shops has been in long-term decline, the drop-off in incidents requiring police presence was far steeper.
Labour MP Carolyn Harris, who chairs a cross-party group of MPs that campaigned for FOBT reform, said the figures suggested the digital roulette machines had been “driving violence and crime in bookmakers and local communities”.
“I am very glad the government finally saw sense and agreed to cut the stake to £2. Low stakes reduces the harm for gamblers and all our communities.”
During the long-running debate over FOBTs, Treasury officials were reportedly concerned about the loss of more than £450m in annual tax contributions.
But several thinktanks argued that the take from machine gaming duty paid on FOBTs was more than offset by social costs, such as the expense of police callouts.
The Centre for Economic and Business Research found that the government would face a net cost of £100m for every year it delayed the stake cut.
Figures released earlier this month also showed that gamblers are now losing significantly less money on the machines, although some will have migrated to playing other products.
FOBT income fell from £1.1bn to £624m between October 2018 and September 2019, even though the £2 stake was in place for less than half of that period.
