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I’m just waiting for the usual bedwetters to start sounding the death knell for British racing after this move.
Irish bookmakers don’t have any FOBTs and the Irish racing scene seems to be doing just fine.
A welcome move by the government
High Street bookmakers would have all but died shortly after the advent of on-line betting and the betting exchanges had they not been thrown this amusement arcade lifeline: ten or so years free rein to fleece the abject, you lucky horrible lot: no skill, no interpretation, no view, no intelligence – 35/1 a 36/1 chance
If there’s anyone out there who’d care to make a book on their estimated chances of an event occurring and open a shop in order to take wagers from others who might take another opinion, I’m sure they’d do decent business
Oh for my Cyril Stein and odds-compilers of yore: you knew
From Tom Kerr’s fine piece in the Post:
“While there are differing views on how many shops will shut – independent analysts Regulus Partners estimated on Thursday that 3,700 out of a total of 8,500 over five years – there is no disputing the fact the retail sector derives more than half its profits from machines.
Stripped of such an astonishing money-spinner thousands of marginal shops will surely prove untenable. (Some point to Ireland as an example of a country where betting shops do not need FOBTs to work, but more than a third of Irish bookies have shut in the past decade while the British retail sector has been largely static.)”
He goes on to cover racecourse attendance figures/marketing:
“It is the most appalling snobbery to assume only non-racing fans could ever get drunk and fight or to tarnish all social racegoers as six pints and a couple lines of cocaine away from a scrap, but it is absolutely correct to observe that millions of racegoers care more about drinking and having fun than they do about the action on the track. This is supported by the racecourses’ own customer research, which in 2015 revealed two-thirds – two-thirds! – of racegoers listed socialising as their main reason for attending, with just 20 per cent giving the sport as their answer and 14 per cent citing betting.”
Kerr’s key point is that racing has been shored up by cash from people who have no interest in the sport. FOBT players have funded massive media rights income and it looks like partygoers rather than racegoers are keeping the tracks going. Remember that the income from both sources does not go to Racing as such; it goes to racecourses, in the main private companies. If there’s any logical long term business outcome here, we should start to see racecourses closing in fairly substantial numbers.
I have to say I’m pleasantly surprised. Fully expected a cop out halfway option. Perhaps paying the price for the lip service they have paid to problem gambling up to this point.
On the ‘but it’ll cost thousands of jobs’ angle, betting shops are notorious for staff turnover aren’t they? Many of those who will now be forced out of work wouldn’t have lasted long anyway. On the rare occasions I’ve been into shops in large city centres, staff are (in some ways understandably) mostly disengaged and fairly useless. They would probably be happier elsewhere. There will be enough shops left for the good, knowledgeable staff who will also hopefully be happier as well.
Interestingly Paddy Power seemed to see the positives in a quote I heard on the radio earlier.
This has taken far to long to come about and i thought the Government would do what they normally do and compromise to half way.
I feel sorry for the people who may lose their jobs but not as sorry as i feel for the hundreds of families affected by a member being addicted to the FOBTs. For once the Government have done the right thing.
All comers, all ground, all beaten
Well done and fair play to the government, this does restore faith that there are a lot of MPs who genuinely do care for us commoners! Good on them and a big kick in the balls to those slimey scaremongering bookie reps with no morals.
Joe, most social attendees still bet on what they’re watching, and in the main lose. Racing revenue right there. Racing has been a social event for years and years, this isn’t a new thing.
Jockey Club courses claim (I’ve no idea on the figures of JCR) to put back profits into racing also, so booze sales etc. Aren’t wasted?
For every 100 social goers, if 5 of those pick up racing as a new hobby brilliant. Without the social aspect of it thousands wouldn’t experience the thoroughbred and what makes the game so interesting. As Tom says, not everyone goes 6 deep and have a bag in their pocket.
May not have a bag in my pocket but I’ll certaintlt have plenty of spliffs at the ready for brigadier Gerard evening next Thursday :D if everyone stuck to the smoke then there’d be no fighting at all!
A good read – as usual – from Simon Jenkins
An over the top piece by Tom Kerr imo. Particularly in relation to racegoers, who have always gone in their millions to enjoy a social day out and probably always will. Its an intrinsic component of British culture for centuries after all.
If all that existed at a racecourse was a stand with a man selling Timeform, there wouldn’t be too many racecourses open either. Nor is there a shred of evidence anywhere that social racegoers are about to abandon their good day out en masse. None whatsoever.
Sure racecourse violence does appear to be trending up, but its still a tiny minority who partake in it. Given a more robust security detail, that particular nuisance will be effectively dealt with too.
Cool your jets Tom.
Drone, if it was 35-1, a 37-1 shot (like in a casino on a real life wheel, 36 numbers and zero)… I doubt there would be much problem. Please don’t believe that this will be the case though. I’d stake a very large amount, that these machines will have a set payout, a percentage of what they take, which they will then pay out. Like a fruit machine. It will not have anything to do with 35-1, whatever the bookies say.
They will be ‘set up’ to give initial hope of a big win. A small win at the start, or close to a win… A computer which is programmed to ‘draw you in’. To prey on a gamblers worst faults. The sole intention of these machines (computer programs), is to fleece as much money as is possible, in the shortest amount of time. Why do you think they are raking billions from them? (It’s not from paying 35-1 on a 37-1 shot lol). How did they become 50%… Yes 50%!!! Of their high street income?
The computerisation of the outcome of an event, is a fairly new thing. Yes it’s regulated, but, how well?
Ask yourself, do you trust them to run a straight game, when they can control the result?
Remember kids… NEVER bet on anything, EVER, where the outcome of the event is dictated by a computer program.
Stick to real life events like Golf, Horses, Football… Two flies walking up the wall. But NEVER on a computer generated outcome to an event.
I’ve no idea how these machines manipulate payout
Are they truly random like a genuine roulette wheel or are they – as you hint – pseudorandom with wins frontloaded to reel in the player. If pseudorandom the stench around these machines just got worse
What are the regulations you mention?
Lol, Drone, I always suspected JRM to be a closet Guardian reader
JRM is Bertie Wooster; I hover, look and occasionally pounce with a big bumblebee buzz: too much buzzing around this green desert recently, though the sweet scent emanating from Cormack’s bulging sporran will always be an enticing pheromone
I love hating the Graun: it is though the best of the very poor lot who once inhabited Fleet Street
Jenkins and Monbiot are worth five minutes of anyone’s time
Toynbee and Jones aren’t
Toynbee and Jones aren’t
Polly’s next article: “Tory FOBT stake-reduction plan dehumanises immigrants and the poor”
(NAP)
Mike
FOBT algos can be set to return any percentage to the punter in overall play, just as all ‘fruit machines’ can. The common return % to punters is at least 97% on FOBTs. The trouble is, as with all machine-based games, punters on them tend to ‘play to extinction’. In other words, if they stake £100 in cash they might have several ‘wins’, but they will in the end lose the £100.
Prior to FOBTs, fruit machines were set to around 85% return (I don’t know what that is now). Smart players of fruit machines (and there were a few) would sense in a remarkably short time when the percentage had been adjusted.
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