BGC Calls on Chancellor to Scrap Betting Shops Tax Rise Ahead of Budget

Young workers, women and communities outside London would bear the brunt of any further tax rise on Britain’s betting shops, the Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) has warned ahead of the Budget. 

The trade body says betting shops support more than 36,000 jobs, and that more than eight in ten of them are outside the capital, in market towns, former industrial communities and seaside towns.

With Chancellor John Healey due to deliver his first Budget on Wednesday 28 October^[1], the BGC is urging him to rule out an increase in Machine Games Duty (MGD), the tax on gaming machine takings that is reportedly being considered for a doubling to 40 per cent.

A younger workforce than the rest of Britain

The most eye-catching figures in the BGC’s latest release are about age.

Almost one in five betting shop employees (19 per cent) is under 25, compared with 11 per cent across the wider economy. More than half (51 per cent) are under 35, against 35 per cent nationally.

The industry pitches this as a first step into work for many young people, offering experience in customer service, cash handling and responsibility, with routes into management.

Women make up half of the workforce, and the BGC points to contracted hours and shift patterns that can fit around childcare and caring responsibilities.

That framing is deliberate. Ministers have made getting more young people into work a priority, and the BGC is betting that a jobs argument will land harder in the Treasury than one about operator profits.

Where the losses would fall

The BGC again cites EY modelling showing that raising MGD to 40 per cent could cost up to 16,000 jobs, put almost 1,500 betting shops and as many as 34 casinos at risk, and leave the Treasury up to £124 million worse off.

Of the jobs potentially at risk, 80 per cent are outside London. Some 27 per cent are in the North of England, rising to almost 40 per cent once Scotland is included.

It follows the BGC’s recent warning that up to 3,800 casino jobs could be lost under the same tax rise, with half of threatened casino closures in the North and Scotland. Taken together, the two releases show the industry building a clear regional case against the Treasury: the pain, it argues, would be felt furthest from Westminster.

“Nobody wins”

Grainne Hurst, Chief Executive of the BGC, said: “Almost one in five betting shop employees is under 25 and more than half are under 35. For many, it is their first job, their first pay packet and their first opportunity to build a career.” 

She added: “That would mean fewer jobs, more empty units on struggling high streets and less money for public services. Nobody wins.” 

Hurst also pointed back to last year’s Budget, when the Treasury said it wanted to support in-person gambling because land-based betting provides greater levels of employment. 

Three asks of the Chancellor

The BGC’s demands go beyond MGD. It wants Healey to rule out any rise in the duty, assess the damage already caused by higher taxes, and halt the planned increase in General Betting Duty.

That last ask is significant. A new 25 per cent remote betting rate within General Betting Duty is due from April 2027, following the rise in Remote Gaming Duty from 21 to 40 per cent this April.^[2] Reversing a measure already legislated for would be a big call for a new Chancellor bound by fiscal rules.