BGC Wages a Human Campaign Against Machine Tax as Budget Day Looms

Key Points

• The BGC initiated its campaign “Back our Betting Shops” on 28 September, backed by EY modelling commissioned by the BGC which shows that a 40% Machine Games Duty rate would endanger 16,000 jobs and almost 1,500 shops, causing the Treasury to lose out on £124m.
• The Social Market Foundation says that the same rate would create income of £275m and up to £458m; their forecasts vary due to the difference in assumptions regarding the evolution of the retail landscape used in each model.
• William Hill, Betfred, Paddy Power, and Entain have made job cuts or closures in 2026; this is real proof for the BGC of an already strained high street.

Betting shops are the next front in Britain’s Budget battle. The Betting and Gaming Council launched Back Our Betting Shops on 28 September, leading with workers, apprentices, and community partners rather than spreadsheets. The Autumn Budget arrives on 28 October, and Chancellor John Healey is reportedly considering a significant Machine Games Duty increase.

Two Models, One Tax, Two Very Different Answers

BGC-commissioned EY modelling sets out the industry’s core warning. According to that modelling, raising Machine Games Duty to 40% could put up to 16,000 jobs and nearly 1,500 betting shops at risk. The same scenario would threaten as many as 34 casinos and leave the Treasury £124 million worse off overall. BGC CEO Grainne Hurst said: “Behind every one of those numbers is a person whose job, income and future could be affected.”

The Social Market Foundation, which lobbied for a higher MGD rate, produces very different numbers from its own analysis. Its report estimates the same increase could generate between £275 million and £458 million from Category B machines. The estimates diverge because the underlying assumptions diverge. EY models significant shop closures, losing corporation tax, business rates, and levy income from each venue that shuts. The SMF applies both static and dynamic estimates to produce a range of projected additional revenue. Which assumptions hold depends entirely on how many shops close, and that question cannot be answered until after the Budget.

Gambling Commission figures for FY2025-26 show machines accounted for 49.4% of gross gambling yield in the non-remote betting sector. That share makes any rate change to MGD a direct impact on the core of what keeps most shops financially viable.

A High Street Already Counting Empty Shopfronts

The BGC is not raising a hypothetical alarm with this campaign. William Hill closed around 200 betting shops from May 2026, with parent company Evoke citing tax increases and rising costs. Betfred opened a consultation on 132 closures and over 600 job cuts on 31 July 2026. Flutter confirmed in September that up to 100 Paddy Power shops are under review, with around 400 roles at risk.

The government raised Remote Gaming Duty from 21% to 40% in April 2026. A new 25% remote betting rate within General Betting Duty arrives in April 2027, replacing the current 15% rate for online sports betting.

Entain CEO Stella David wrote to Prime Minister Burnham on the direct cost of a higher MGD rate. A rise to 40% would add roughly £100 million annually to Entain’s UK retail costs. The letter came as Entain was separately reviewing 2,000 customer care roles, with around 400 potentially facing redundancy. Those are related pressures on the same business, though the consultation was already under way before any formal MGD decision.

Betfred founder Fred Done gave the most direct industry forecast of any operator. He warned that a 40% MGD rate would immediately trigger 495 Betfred shop closures. Speaking to the Racing Post, Done said: “I believe that by 2030, we will have no betting shops.” Done runs the single largest retail betting chain in Britain, so that statement carries more than rhetoric.

The BGC says more than 3,000 betting shops have closed since 2019, costing over 16,000 jobs. Twenty-two casinos shut over the same period, losing more than 3,000 jobs. A further 108 bingo clubs closed, taking over 2,000 more jobs with them. Despite those losses, the BGC says betting shops still support 36,000 jobs across Britain. The wider regulated sector generates more than £4 billion in annual tax revenue for the Exchequer.

The BGC Takes the Debate Into the PM’s Own Backyard

The BGC’s most deliberate choice is where it launched the campaign first. Makerfield in Greater Manchester is Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s own constituency. An Opinium poll cited by the BGC found 54% of Makerfield residents believe betting shops benefit community life, including 51% of Labour voters in the area. More than one in four Makerfield adults placed a sports or racing bet in the previous twelve months.

Hurst addressed Burnham directly: “The Prime Minister has said policies should face a ‘Makerfield test’, that if they don’t work for people here and don’t lift them up, they shouldn’t happen at all. The Prime Minister only has to look at his own constituency to see why that matters.”

The political pressure surrounding that statement runs in both directions. Burnham compared betting shops to “rogue” outlets on British high streets in recent weeks. Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown publicly called for an MGD rise at the end of August 2026. The BGC has been working against a Labour-aligned political direction for well over a year.

Horseracing Has More to Lose Than Most Realise

British horseracing carries more exposure in this debate than most headline coverage suggests. BGC members contribute more than £350 million annually to British racing through the statutory Horserace Betting Levy and direct sponsorship. Betting shops account for around £140 million of that total each year. Analysis cited in the BGC’s campaign material suggests 3,000 shop closures could cut levy receipts by around £70 million annually. That figure does not include the further drop in media rights income that would follow widespread closures.

British racing ran its own ‘Axe the Racing Tax’ campaign last autumn. Voluntary race meeting blackouts were part of that effort, including a full shutdown on 10 September 2025. The sport is not standing back from this Budget debate.

Expert Analysis: The FOBT Pattern, and Whether This Campaign Can Break It

The BGC’s closure data starts from 2019, and that is not a coincidence. That year, the maximum stake on Fixed Odds Betting Terminals fell from £100 to £2. The reduction restructured the economics of every retail betting shop in Britain nearly overnight. Machine-generated gambling yield, as Gambling Commission figures confirm, represents close to half of what a shop earns from gambling activity. MGD is, in effect, a charge on the engine room of the modern betting shop.

Britain’s betting industry has built genuine political sympathy around horseracing and grassroots sport. The public health argument around B2 machines runs in the opposite direction, and both things can be true at once. Campaigners behind the 2019 FOBT reforms view a higher MGD as a public health measure, not a fiscal instrument. For them, fewer machines on the high street is an intended outcome, not an unfortunate consequence.

What strikes us is how clearly this campaign is designed to shift the frame away from machines and toward people. The Guardian reported in July 2025 that the BGC hosted a darts evening for Labour advisers and MPs’ staff as part of a broader effort to head off tax increases. That lobbying ran more than fifteen months before this campaign went public. The fact that a public people-centred campaign is now necessary tells its own story about how far those private efforts moved the dial.

In our view, the government may well raise Machine Games Duty in some form on 28 October. No formal MGD decision has been announced, and the confirmed Budget date is not a policy commitment. Whether any increase reaches the full 40% in a single step remains genuinely uncertain. The EY modelling warns that even a partial rise may cost the Treasury more in lost receipts than it brings in. Back Our Betting Shops is a precisely aimed campaign with a clear political target. Whether it shifts Healey’s arithmetic, or simply places the industry’s documented warning on record, becomes clear the moment the Budget opens.