Machine changes may be no jackpot

The news that the review of gaming machines has been brought forward by a year has been greeted with enthusiasm by sectors of the trade, in particular the bingo operators whose plight has been heavily publicised. They stand to gain greatly from the possible doubling of the number of high-payout machines, but whether it will stem the steady drop in the numbers of clubs is open to doubt. Their plight is at least as bad as that of the pub trade.

Smoking and machines are closely linked. It was very apparent when I talked to licensees after the smoking ban came in that machine income had been hit hard, because smokers for some reason tended to sit and use the machines. Faced with a ban on one of their habits, the other one went as well!

The pub industry has for many years been frustrated by the fact that they are only allowed low jackpot machines compared with clubs. The policy on this was that clubs offered a more controlled environment and that public gaming should be closely controlled — as it now is with poker, for example.

One significant battle was won during the passage of the new Gambling Act when pubs gained automatic entitlement to two machines, so by-passing the old section 34 permit system, which was more a nuisance than anything else. True, if you want more machines, you have to apply for a new-style permit, but the vast majority of pubs will have their machines as of right.

But any Government concessions on jackpots — £75 is being proposed, although from the trade itself — may well come at a price. The Chancellor is not giving anything away, and the machine duty will undoubtedly reflect the increased payout, as indeed it did last time around. This is by no means a tax concession for the trade, even if it comes about as a result of the review.

But it is early days. While it is clear that the Government has in some measure responded to the tales of woe from a beleaguered sector, the minister was at pains to point out that increasing limits is not the

universal panacea to underlying problems. And this has to be taken on board, because an idle £75 machine is as useless to you as an idle £35 one.

But every little helps. If a rise can attract the punters back into the pub, all well and good. Let us hope that the industry's negotiators make a better fist of this than they have

done on other issues recently.