Coulson: To allow bookmaking in your pub is a total non-starter

By Peter Coulson

- Last updated on GMT

Related tags Bookmaker Gambling

Coulson: To allow bookmaking in your pub is a total non-starter
Peter Coulson says that bookmaking is a non-starter in your pub

There has been much talk in the political columns about "triangulation", which is a polite way of describing the technique by which governments say one thing to one country and quite a different thing to another.

Down my way, we call this hypocrisy. And it is not just in the national political arena that it occurs, my friends.

Take the new chairman of the Gambling Commission, Brian Pomeroy. He has lost no time in learning the lesson that one of the ways to woo a section of the gambling community is to knock another, in this case the pub trade.

I picked up a note of his recent speech to the Bingo Association, in which he wanted to have a pot at illegal activity and to show that the commission was proactive, vibrant and alert — three attributes not immediately associated with the Birmingham-based quango.

What really caught my eye was the following:

"We have… taken enforcement action against bookmakers systematically taking bets on alcohol-licensed premises (pubs)."

Really? Systematically? Nothing has been reported in the trade press recently. The commission issued a warning notice back in February that did not gain much publicity, but where is this action?

Long pause. Then eventually a phone call. "We do not comment on ongoing action of this kind. There have been no prosecutions as such yet, but we will let you know when there are."

So, Mr Pomeroy was guilty of nothing more than an incorrect choice of tense: what he meant to say was that the commission will be taking enforcement action at some time in the future. So that's all right, then.

But I still have problems with the use of the word "systematically". It suggests that there is regular activity of this kind, with the collusion of licensees, which can not only result in prosecution of the bookmaker, but also action against the licence-holder, with a possible suspension or revocation of the premises licence.

That is serious stuff, and it is very important that the licensed trade and the commission are both aware of what is happening.

Bookmakers

I have regularly mentioned this topic on these pages: actual book-making activity of any kind on pub premises is strictly illegal. Allowing bookmakers or their employees to enter a pub to take bets or to pay out winnings can render the licensee liable to a heavy penalty.

Few, if any, licensees are unaware of the risk they run. It is almost as well known in the trade as underage selling.

There is, however, a problem with taking bets as a favour for customers, where the licensee himself has an account with a bookie.

Acting as a betting "intermediary", which this is, is also illegal and carries the same hefty penalties as permitting bookies to carry on business in the bar.

However, watching televised racing, marking up a betting slip, discussing bets with friends, asking a friend to take your bet to the betting shop, even phoning the bookmaker where you have an account — these are all perfectly legal in a pub bar.

It is only the actual transactions of book-making, such as accepting bets or paying out winnings, which must not take place in any way on the premises. If you suspect that someone is regularly turning up to make himself available to punters, then you must put a stop to it or risk prosecution.

Turning a blind eye just will not do. A good licensee is all too aware of any form of dealing on his premises, including drugs, illicit trading and the like. Betting is just the same. But it would be helpful if the commission itself decided to keep the licensed trade in its communications loop.

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