Ninety Labour MPs Urge Chancellor to Create Higher Machine Games Duty Rate for Category B Machines

^{Ninety Labour MPs have asked the Chancellor for a higher Machine Games Duty rate on Category B machines ahead of the Budget. (Photo: Dietmar Rabich / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0)}

Ninety Labour MPs have written to Chancellor John Healey asking him to introduce a new, higher rate of Machine Games Duty (MGD) on Category B machines in the Budget on 28 October, in a letter that adds fresh pressure to an already tense debate over gambling taxation.

The letter, dated 16 October, was led by Alex Ballinger, Labour MP for Halesowen and co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Gambling Reform. According to British Journal, Ballinger published it on Friday. The MPs describe a higher Category B rate as "a popular, targeted and proportionate way to raise revenue".

What the Letter Asks For

The letter does not name a specific rate. It points instead to modelling by the Social Market Foundation, under which a 40 per cent rate could raise between £275 million and £458 million a year once significant changes in player behaviour are taken into account.

The MPs focus on B3 machines, which allow stakes of up to £2 and prizes of up to £500. They say lower-category machines would be unaffected, pubs would sit wholly outside the scope of any increase, and the abolition of Bingo Duty would stay protected, so bingo itself remains duty-free.

MGD currently has three rates of 5, 20 and 25 per cent, set by the cost of play and the top prize, and Category B machines sit in the 20 per cent band. The MPs ask the Chancellor to apply the same principles used at the 2025 Budget, which raised Remote Gaming Duty from 21 to 40 per cent and abolished Bingo Duty.

Adult Gaming Centres in the Frame

The letter leans heavily on adult gaming centres (AGCs). It says 47 per cent of them are in the most deprived fifth of the country, and that the most deprived local authorities have more than six times as many per head as the least deprived.

It also cites polling attributed to the Social Market Foundation and Survation, in which 43 per cent of voters backed higher taxes on slot machines in high-street betting shops, against 11 per cent who backed a cut.

The MPs describe a higher Category B rate as "a popular, targeted and proportionate way to raise revenue".

Industry Pushes Back

The industry had already written to the Chancellor. British Journal reports that the chief executives of Entain, Flutter UK and Ireland, bet365, Bally's Corporation, evoke and Betfred wrote on 14 October, citing EY analysis of a 40 per cent Category B rate.

That analysis suggests a further 690 to 1,470 betting shops and 28 to 34 casinos could close, between 11,600 and 15,900 jobs could be lost, and the Exchequer could end up as much as £124 million worse off once other tax losses are counted. The EY report itself has not been published.

Grainne Hurst, chief executive of the Betting and Gaming Council, called it "deeply misguided" to suggest that higher taxes on betting shops and casinos would protect high streets, according to British Journal. Bacta, the trade association for land-based gaming and amusements, said the proposals "would kill the British seaside and cost thousands of jobs".

The BGC has been running its Back Our Betting Shops campaign ahead of the Budget. Healey is due to deliver the Budget on 28 October, when the decision on Machine Games Duty will be known.