After a 15-year campaign the announcement on Thursday that the maximum stake on Fixed Odds Betting Terminals will be cut to £2 felt like the final stop on a very long journey. While there is still an outside chance the decision will be challenged, the blunt language of Matt Hancock, the digital, culture, media and sport secretary, calling the machines a “social blight” and talking about the “misery” FOBTs have caused, suggests the bookies’ battle has been utterly lost. Any recourse to the courts would simply delay the inevitable.
Some bookmakers, in fact, have already started to plan for a FOBT-free future – or a roulette-free future, at any rate, since that is the game that should never have been let loose at £100 a spin in the first place.
Greg Knight, the managing director of the 100-shop chain Jenningsbet, is one. “We should look at this as the start of a new chapter,” he told the Racing Post. “It has been a long, hard few years and I’m looking forward to going to work again without being under constant attack.
“The retail betting industry needs to go back to its roots, and that means a more collaborative and healthy relationship with horse and greyhound racing. Let’s get back to doing what we do best.”
Paddy Power, which has 600 shops, also issued a relatively upbeat statement, talking about the “reputational damage” suffered by the entire gambling industry, both on the high street and online, as a result of the machines. These were refreshing expressions of positivity after the increasingly desperate predictions of impending doom that emerged from the bookies’ side of the barricade, as it became clear that their battle against a £2 maximum was being lost.
Some punters, meanwhile, have seized on the FOBTs decision as a sign that the old order of 20 years ago will soon be restored. Without the easy money to be made from gaming, the reasoning goes, bookies will now be obliged to accept a decent bet from customers they have previously banned or restricted to pennies.
There is some way to go yet, however, before punters finally get the fair deal from betting firms, in both the retail and online sectors, that the Gambling Commission was set up to deliver. The £2-per-spin limit on FOBTs is a vital first step which will, as Knight suggests, help to detoxify high-street gambling’s image as it tries to go “back to its roots” but for as long as online betting continues to operate with wafer-thin or non-existent margins, the retail sector will struggle to compete.
It is this, as much as anything, that has led to the current situation where thousands of ordinary punters find themselves banned or restricted to pitiful stakes by online firms.
A glance at an odds-comparison website on Saturday morning revealed that no fewer than 18 races were on offer with an over-round at best prices of 8% or less, including the majority of the events on the high-profile cards at Newbury and Newmarket. In several, most or all of the margin was accounted for by rank outsiders, and this is before considering the long-term effect of offers like “best odds guaranteed” and the free bets and sign-up offers which entice new customers or compensate for near-misses.
The bookmakers got some bad news last week, so here is a bulletin that the punters will not like. When betting online it is simply too easy for shrewd backers to win. A status once reserved for only the most diligent form-book students is now available to anyone with a laptop and a basic understanding of spreadsheets. Why study form when five minutes’ looking at the markets will pinpoint all the standout prices?
As a result most online firms have gravitated towards the same business plan: open accounts by the thousand, via eye-catching offers “for new customers only”, push them towards no-risk gaming products wherever possible and then swiftly restrict or close anyone whose business shows the tell-tale signs of “limited profitability”.
The loss of billions in FOBT profits in the retail sector will make no difference to this. The only thing that will is the introduction of a minimum bet guarantee as a condition of every bookmakers’ licence, as they would then have little choice but to trade more defensively. After the hugely welcome news on FOBTs last week a minimum bet rule is the obvious next step towards a fair and sustainable playing field for punters and bookies alike.
Royal Ascot contender
Sergei Prokofiev is the new favourite for the Coventry Stakes at Royal Ascot next month following a four-length success in the five-furlong Rochestown Stakes at Naas on Sunday.
From Scat Daddy’s final crop of foals, the colt went off favourite at 2-7 to follow up a win at Navan last month. He was settled close to the lead by Ryan Moore and then quickened into a decisive lead over a furlong out.
Aidan O’Brien, Sergei Prokofiev’s trainer, has another Royal Ascot candidate in Sioux Nation, who took the six-furlong Group Three Lacken Stakes by a length and a quarter from stable companion Fleet Review. Paddy Power cut him to 7-1 (from 10-1) for the Group One Commonwealth Cup.
Redcar 2.05 Zebzardee 2.35 Furni Factors 3.05 Displaying Amber 3.35 Amandine 4.05 Merry Banter (nap) 4.35 Make On Madam 5.05 Savaanah 5.35 Boko Fittleworth
Carlisle 2.15 Hard Forest 2.45 Seen The Lyte 3.15 Uptown Funk 3.45 Raselasad (nb) 4.15 Arbalet 4.45 Ventura Gold 5.15 Presidential
5.45 Redrosezorro
Towcester 2.25 Pontresina 2.55 Windspiel 3.25 Starcrossed 3.55 Bassarabad 4.25 Take To Heart 4.55 Dizzey Heights
Leicester 6.00 Good Tyne Girl 6.30 Flashman 7.00 Making Miracles
7.30 Dolcissimo 8.00 Flirtare 8.30 Genetics
Windsor 6.15 Come On Leicester 6.45 Satisfying 7.15 Alwaysandforever 7.45 The Tin Man 8.15 Agrotera 8.45 Junoesque
