HC Deb 26 June 1964 vol 697 cc806-15

Amendment made: In page 3, line 17 leave out "I" and insert: (Provision of certain amusements with prizes at certain commercial entertainments)"—[Mr. Buck.]

11.30 a.m.

Mr. Antony Buck (Colchester)

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

It is perhaps a happy feature of our parliamentary affairs that even a few weeks before what will clearly be one of the most hard-fought General Elections there has ever been we can still, nevertheless, co-operate on an inter-party and non-partisan basis to reform the law in a small but significant way. The flame of party co-operation has perhaps burned a little low over recent weeks, but it is a happy feature that it lingers on at least sufficiently on this fine Friday morning to see through the Betting, Gaming and Lotteries (Amusements with Prizes) Bill.

As the House knows, the Bill effects a small but useful reform of the law in that it ensures that the intention of Parliament when it passed the principal Act of 1963 is properly carried out. At a fairly early stage that Act ran into certain difficulties. Perhaps I may summarise them. There seemed to be doubts in the minds of certain authorities whether they had discretion in granting licences for permitting certain machines, such as we are considering today, to be installed on premises. After the case of Hewison v Skegness Urban District Council it became clear that under the principal Act it was not possible for the local authorities to impose conditions on the granting of a licence.

The Bill takes care of that situation and further, as the House well knows, it provides a limitation on the amount for prizes which it was considered in Committee and is still considered to be appropriate.

I have taken the opportunity of trying to check on the point raised by the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies), dealt with previously by the Joint Under-Secretary of State, about the position of gaming and betting at what may be described at private functions or political functions. The Bill does not refer to that in any way and the position remains totally unaltered, being governed by Sections 48 and 43 of the principal Act which, as I understand it, gives such functions a special position and a large degree of exemption from the provisions of the principal Act. The hon. Member need have no fears or misgivings about giving the Bill a Third Reading on the score of the worries which he expressed in the discussion earlier.

This is a small, but useful Bill. It is very important, it may be thought, that the will of Parliament be carried out. The Bill ensures that what Parliament wanted to be done in 1963 is now clearly done. It does not make the law simple, for the law can seldom be simple, since we live not in a simple society but in a highly sophisticated society. But it meets the need to clarify the law and the needs which were expressed by local authority organisations to make the position of the granting of these licences clear and understandable, giving them, as it does, a virtually unfettered discretion to grant licences and impose conditions when applications are made for them.

That is the effect of Clause 2. It is what local authorities wanted and it is what Parliament originally intended they should have. It is what the House will give them if it gives the Bill a Third Reading.

11.35 a.m.

Mr. Harold Davies

Naturally, hon. Members on both sides of the House welcome the Bill. Although some of us did not work on the Committee we tried to follow it as intelligently as we could, bearing in mind the other work which we have to do. It was thought that the 1963 Act had cleared up a number of anomalies, but this is a complex and difficult world, and all the time we are coming across complexities in betting, gaming and lotteries.

There was a constructive point in the question which I put, because the Minister must be aware that quite innocent people are often put into difficulty in these matters. Even the Sunday-school teacher offering free home-made jam tarts as a prize is sometimes worried about the complexity of the situation and whether it is a game of chance coming within the purview of the Home Office or the police. Often the local village constable and others do not like to be asked questions about the legality of these acts because their solution is beyond their ken and beyond the ken of those who are organising the fête. Consequently, anything which clears the position up and makes it simpler is welcome. I thank the hon. Member.

11.36 a.m.

Mr. Lipton

I have many reservations about the Bill, despite the interesting remarks with which the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Buck) moved the Third Reading. I still think that the prize-money total is far too low and that it will continue to constitute a temptation to a certain number of people to evade the provisions of the Bill.

We are resuming what is becoming a well-established tradition in that we think that we have solved a problem by a fairly comprehensive piece of legislation, as we thought was the case when we passed the 1963 Act, and then a year or so later we find that it is necessary to produce amending legislation. It almost seems that we should have an annual Bill like the Finance Bill, dealing with betting, gaming and lotteries, to catch up with the tricks, the stunts and the ingenious ideas which come to light when we try to impose a regulation or restriction.

Possibly in the next Parliament it will be found necessary, through a Private Member's Bill, not through the Government, to produce another Bill to close another loop-hole. In this respect, the amusements industry and the accountants advising on tax avoidance have the same object in view—to get away with something which they should not be getting away with and to try to overcome a barrier which we thought was effective and which we had imposed in previous legislation.

The hon. Member for Colchester correctly says that the Bill strengthens the powers of local authorities, but I believe that local authorities are still a little anxious about the fact that there does not seem to be any specific provision to authorise a local authority to limit the days and hours when amusement machines may be made available to the public. Does the Bill give local authorities power to limit machines to a specified part of the premises?

These doubts have been expressed, and I hope that in his final valedictory address on the Bill the Joint Under-Secretary of State will be able to clear up these doubts. Will he give an assurance that all the doubts expressed by local authorities will be met by the Bill?

Sir S. McAdden

I do not wish to detain the House for more than a moment or two. I warmly support the Third Reading of the Bill and hope very much that this new piece of legislation will do what it sets out to do. We have had an unfortunate record of betting, gaming, and lotteries Bills in the past. We have had repeated assurances that the operation of commercial bingo would be impossible under earlier legislation, but this has not proved to be the case, and it has been necessary for amending legislation to be brought in.

I hope that the Bill will achieve what it sets out to achieve, because our past experience of legislation in this sphere has not been altogether happy. Some of the events which have taken place have been a surprise even to the Parliamentary draftsmen who thought that everything was nicely tied up, only to discover that that was not so. I wish the Bill godspeed, and hope that that will not happen on this occasion.

11.41 a.m.

Mr. H. Hynd (Accrington)

I doubt whether we have come to the end of the series of Bills to try to deal with this complicated subject. I do not altogether understand the legislation governing betting, gaming and lotteries. At this time of the year, when so many garden fêtes are being held for charitable and other purposes, all sorts of games are played which I, in my innocence, thought were illegal.

As a magistrate, I once had the experience of having to order the destruction of a machine taken from a café. Two days later at a pier—not Westminster or Southend pier—I found machines of the same type being operated quite openly and apparently legally.

It seems that one way round the problem is by forming a club. Apparently by paying a nominal fee and becoming a member of a so-called club, the door is opened fairly wide for all sorts and kinds of betting, gaming, and lotteries. The whole subject has not been cleared up, and in the hope that this Bill is one of the further steps towards the eventual cleaning up of the whole subject, I shall have little difficulty in supporting it.

Before finally agreeing to the Bill being read the Third time, there is, however, one question which I should like to ask the hon. Gentleman: now that we are to have a pause in legislation, would it be possible for the Home Office to issue a pamphlet explaining in fairly simple language for the benefit of nontechnical and non-legal people like myself just where we have got to in the way of controlling this subject?

11.42 a.m.

Mr. Woodhouse

It is a well-deserved tribute to the skill and moderation of the sponsors of the Bill that, although, as the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) said, it deals with a complex and difficult subject—and this has been reflected in several of the brief speeches today—it has secured such a smooth passage through the House. I am sure that the House would agree that it would be light for me to pay a tribute to my right hon. and noble Friend the former Member for Edinburgh, Pent-lands, Lord John Hope, and to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Chertsey (Sir L. Heald), who have played such a conspicuous part in promoting it.

The proceedings have shown a large unanimity of view, with certain reservations which have been expressed by the hon. Member for Brixton (Mr. Lipton) and others, both on the objects of the Bill and on the means of achieving them. I think that this was illustrated by the very short time which it was found necessary to devote to the Bill in Committee upstairs.

Several hon. Members have referred to other sections of the betting, gaming and lotteries legislation and have suggested that a wider or further Amendment of it may be necessary. This, indeed, is common ground. I explained in my speech on Second Reading, at column 802, on 28th February 1964, that we recognised that there were a number of other points in the law which needed revision, but that they needed careful and thorough study, and that this particular loophole was a clear and definite one which it seemed appropriate, once it had been identified, to deal with expeditiously on its own.

I shall certainly take note of the point made by the hon. Member for Accrington (Mr. H. Hynd) that we should consider the preparation of an explanatory pamphlet to put the whole matter in simple terms. I shall look at that, because I know that it is something which would be widely appreciated.

I ought also to take this opportunity of clarifying and emphasising the exact effect of the Bill, in the hope that my Third Reading speech may serve as a substitute for such a pamphlet, at any rate in relation to this particular amendment of the law, because the amendments that we are introducing, although they are small, are important and fundamental to the 1963 Act.

I want to do that not only because of the questions which have been put to me this morning—and, in parenthesis, I should like to say that I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Mr. Buck) for confirming that I gave the right answer to one that was shot at me rather suddenly—but because the Home Secretary and I have received a great deal of correspondence which suggests that there are still fairly wide misconceptions about the Bill itself, I should like to take this opportunity to clear up those misconceptions.

One of the main objects of the Bill is to prevent the abuse of the system of amusements with prizes by the offer of prizes in kind of considerable value, because that goes beyond the proper conception of an amusement and introduces something very close to gaming. On the other hand, it was never the purpose of the sponsors of the Bill to place restrictions on the offer of prizes in kind as virtually to exclude them altogether. Indeed, the Royal Commission on Betting, Lotteries and Gaming contemplated that amusement machines should provide prizes in kind rather than in cash.

Most of the machines which have come into use in recent years are intended to provide goods, whether directly or indirectly, by a system of tokens, and many of these machines are very costly. Whatever the intention, there was a danger that the Bill as originally drafted would place such restrictions on the use of such machines as to render many of them virtually useless, so causing a heavy capital loss both to the manufacturers and to the purchasers. In the Government's opinion the Amendments made to the Bill have removed the most serious of these dangers and have met the legitimate interests of the manufacturers and caterers without in any way prejudicing the essential objects of the Bill.

There is no need for me to mention the amendment which has been made to make the use of tokens permissible, without which the possibility of providing prizes in kind would have been severely limited, but there are two other improvements which have been made in the Bill which deserve further mention. The first of these is the Amendment accepted in Committee to increase the maximum value of the prize in kind obtainable on a single winning stake from 1s. to 5s. I think that the hon. Member for Brixton had that in mind. I do not know whether he unintentionally said that the ceiling was too low. I assumed that he meant that it was too high.

Mr. Lipton

I said that the ceiling was too low, and that because it was only 5s. the temptation to evade it would be all the greater.

Mr. Woodhouse

I see the hon. Gentleman's point. It must be a matter of judgment where the ceiling is fixed. It is substantially higher now than it was when the Bill was originally introduced. I think that there is good reason for this, because at present money values there are not many goods which can be offered usefully for Is. Although increasing the limit to 5s. increases the incentive to play the machines, I do not think that it can be regarded as introducing any very wild element of gaming.

It could be questioned why the limit for prizes in kind had been increased in this way, while leaving the limit for cash prizes unchanged at Is. Our feeling is that there is here no true comparability between the two cases, because with prizes in kind there is a restriction of choice which does not apply with money prizes.

It is not possible, in the case of prizes in kind, as it is with money prizes, to win quite large sums by an accumulation of winning stakes. The Bill deliberately does not permit several prizes in kind, each of a value of 5s., to be exchanged for a single prize equivalent to their total value, the object being, I repeat, to provide innocent amusements of a type with which all hon. Members will be familiar—for instance, on fairgrounds—and not open up possibilities of serious gaming.

The second amendment, is, in its way, just as important, though it did not have very much discussion in Committee. Its effect will be to delay the operation of Clause 1, which limits the value of prizes in kind, until 31st October, 1965. This was a concession made during the Committee stage because it will allow people who have only recently installed machines which may have cost several hundreds of pounds to continue for a short period to use them without limitation of prizes and, therefore, to recoup their heavy capital outlay.

The operative date of 31st October next year was chosen because the genuine amusement place's business is naturally heaviest during the summer holiday season, and by giving them until the end of October next year we are providing for the whole of the 1965 holiday season to be covered. After that date, the 5s. limit will apply. People who install machines from now on will do so in the full knowledge of that fact and on an assessment of the amount of profit which the machines are likely to bring with the reduced incentive to play them.

I should also point out that Clause 2(2) is now to be brought into operation immediately on the Bill's passage and not, as the Bill originally provided, six months thereafter. This is the Clause which empowers local authorities, when granting or renewing permits for premises other than amusement places, to limit the amusement or number of machines to be provided. We see no good reason why there should be any delay in the operation of that provision. If a local authority decides to limit the number of machines which an establishment may have, it can do so only on the first application for a permit when the machines have yet to be installed and no financial loss can be incurred, or on the renewal of the permit when the proprietor or the establishment or other person concerned will have had at least three years' use of any of the machines which may be rendered redundant during which time he can reasonably be expected to have recovered the capital outlay. To bring this provision into operation at once could not, therefore, be considered inequitable, and if local authorities are to be given these powers of control the sooner they are enabled to assume them the better.

The second main object of the Bill is to strengthen the local authorities' discretion in the grant of permits for amusement machines to establishments which are not genuine amusement places within the definition given in Clause 2(5). From the correspondence which we have received, it seems that there is a fairly widespread misconception that the Bill will absolutely prohibit amusement machines being installed in such premises as cafés and public houses and, by so doing, will go well beyond the intentions of the Betting and Gaming Act, 1960, in which the provisions on amusements with prizes were first contained.

But this is not so; this is a mistake. It was never Parliament's intention that amusement machines should be widely installed except in such places as arcades and funfairs, but there was nothing in the 1960 Act, and there is nothing in the Bill, which precludes local authorities altogether from granting permits to public houses or, indeed, to any other premises as they think fit.

The Bill gives the authorities a truly effective discretion to decide whether the machines shall be installed in such premises or not, and, if they agree that they may be to decide, if they wish, how many machines there should be and of what types. I think that it is probable that many authorities will want to make use of this discretion to confine the use of the machines to genuine amusement places, but the decision will be theirs. That is the intention.

In the Government's view, that is entirely as it should be, because it is a matter for the judgment of those who best know the local needs and local circumstances and who can take the sense of local opinion.

Mr. Lipton

Can the hon. Gentleman say whether or not the local authority has power to limit the days and hours when amusement machines are made available?

Mr. Woodhouse

Not under the Bill. There is, however, other legislation governing opening and closing hours. The Bill does not touch that aspect.

I hope that I have explained sufficiently clearly the scope and content of the Bill as it stands before the House after amendment. It has always had the Government's support, and it is still more welcome to the Government in its amended form. I have no hesitation in commending it to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.