The horse racing industry is the largest employer in West Berkshire (after the Council) generating some £20 million annually in the local economy. But much more than this, it is part of our heritage and our story. Lambourn is home to some of the most famous trainers in the country and Newbury Racecourse puts West Berkshire on the map.
However, it is now facing an uncertain future due to the potential implications of the Government’s Gambling Act Review following a White Paper published earlier this year.
Let me start by saying that the ambitions of this Review are laudable. Problem gambling ruins lives. It sucks people in, can become highly addictive and lead to a terrible downward spiral where people are betting money they don’t have and losing everything.
However, the evidence strongly suggests that this type of gambling has distinct and pernicious features and is far more likely to take place in casino-type games like poker, particularly online.
It is far less a feature of horse-racing where many people may go once or twice a year for a big day out and a flutter with a group of friends.
The changes proposed by the Gambling Commission include new “affordability checks”. This could require people having to prove their income level at the races via something like bank information or payslips. The threshold at which this kicks in is on losses of £125 over a rolling 30-day period and takes no account of earning differentials or previous winnings before the checks are required.
The White Paper envisages that most affordability tests would be “frictionless” and that the most intrusive requests would affect only “around 3% of gambling accounts”. But given that there are 31.9 million active gambling accounts in the UK, 3% is still several hundred thousand people.
A survey conducted by British Racing in October 2023 suggested half of all racegoers would stop or reduce their betting if affordability checks were to come in and – perhaps more significantly – 40% would explore black market gambling options instead.
This is counterproductive. Gambling revenue contributes to racing prize money and is part of what makes the industry competitive. Even now, our prize money is already lower than that out of nearest rivals such as France and Ireland and trainers have warned about an exodus of talent.
But even more importantly, the Horseracing Betting Levy (an amount returned to the industry from the proceeds of gambling) provides essential funding for equine welfare development and veterinary science, all things the industry takes seriously and are hugely important to animal welfare.
The British Horseracing Authority says that few people betting on racing will severely impact the levy and set horseracing on a path of financial decline.
This week I made a speech in Parliament urging the Government to remove racing from its affordability threshold test and increase the overall rate of the levy to British racing more broadly. Problem gambling can be addressed without targeting horseracing and I will always stand up for this treasured sport.