Labour Opens Door to Massive Tax Hike on Gambling Sector – Guido Fawkes

Labour Opens Door to Massive Tax Hike on Gambling Sector

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Yesterday the government quietly launched an open consultation on the tax treatment of remote gambling. In it tax minister James Murray says: “the three-tax system needs to adapt to reflect the dynamic and expanding nature of the sector. The time has come to consider moving to a single tax for UK-facing remote gambling.” Harmonisation which opens the door to a huge hike…

There are currently three taxes in application: Remote Gaming Duty at 21% of operator profit, General Betting Duty at 15% of profit, and Pool Betting Duty at 15% of net stake receipts. Tax harmonisation is purely an opportunity to raise the general rate…

After the budget Reeves told businesses she is “not coming back with more borrowing or more taxes.“ Remember that?

Betting and Gaming Council CEO Grainne Hurst says any further tax rises will fail to raise more cash for the Treasury after years of successive governments battering the industry. Horse-racing is particularly at risk…

Eyebrows have also been raised at Labour’s claim in the consultation that online gambling has seen 208% growth since 2014. Strategic advisors Regulus Partners say that calculation “ignores the fact that remote gambling licensing, and therefore taxation, was based on Point of Supply until November 2014. As a result, seven months of the 2014/15 year were under PoS and not Point of Consumption, which means that a large number of operators were not reporting gross gambling yield to the Gambling Commission. The 208% growth statistic is therefore based on a false comparison.” If you do the sums properly 36% is the actual growth figure…

Prominent anti-gambling campaigners are linked with Labour. The cash-hungry Treasury is exploring all options….