Taxation: Gambling

Mr. Betts
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the effect of changes to amusement machine licence duty announced in the 2009 Budget on (a) pubs, (b) seaside arcades, (c) bingo clubs and (d) the gaming machine industry.

Angela Eagle
The Treasury assess the broad impact of changes to gambling taxes and duties but the information collected by HMRC from amusement machine licence duty returns does not identify the sector in which the machine is located. Budget 2009 announced an increase in amusement machine licence duty, which is expected to add around one percentage point to gaming machines' effective tax rate. The costings implications can be found in table A1 of the Financial Statement and Budget Report.