Desperate poor people will be fleeced by new gambling laws aimed at recovering the Government’s own losses, says the Church’s Mission and Public Affairs Council (MPA).
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Second Consultation proposes to double the stakes and prizes for fruit machines and even larger increases for ‘crane-grab’ machines. Together with the Methodist Church, the Quakers, the Salvation Army and the Evangelical Alliance, the MPA has criticised the Government for giving in to industry pressure, instead of defending desperately poor people.
In the MPA’s response to the consultation, it said: “While it is tempting to justify socially harmful policies by pointing to their economic benefits, it is wrong that people who are liable to engage in problem gambling should be made to pay the price of protecting businesses from financial pressures.”
An insider at the department confirmed that after the first consultation on the gambling regulations “the majority of respondents were from the gambling industry.”