Chancellor backs down on bingo duty but is it enough to save clubs?

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, has announced plans to reduce bingo duty from 22% to 20% in the Pre-Budget Report.

Rochdale Online reported earlier this year how players and staff at Rochdale's Mecca Bingo planned to fight the proposed tax increase on their winnings.

More than 700 people wrote to Rochdale MP Paul Rowen in a bid to get the taxation rate brought back down.

In his last Budget the Chancellor had increased the tax on bingo winnings from 15% to 22%, making it the most heavily taxed form of gaming.

An Independent Report by Ernst & Young LLP was published in October showing that the increases in bingo taxation was placing an additional burden on the industry and that bingo operators of all sizes, including Mecca Bingo in Rochdale, were adversely impacted. The report also stated that to achieve the exchequer yield anticipated in the 2009 Budget, the tax should have been set at 18%, and not 22%.

Rochdale MP Paul Rowen said: “I am pleased that the Chancellor has backed down and has made this concession over the level of bingo duty.

"However I feel he should have reduced it even further to at least 18%. This would have been in line with the recommendations of the independent report.

"The tax has caused many bingo halls to shut down, impacting the older, mostly female clientele, for many of whom bingo is not just a game.

"Bingo clubs are a valuable institution in the local community, creating jobs and providing people of all ages with a place to socialise and relax.

“I have received hundreds of letters from frequenters of Mecca Bingo in Rochdale on this subject. People rely on bingo as a central part of their social life and I hope that this cut in taxation goes some way to relieving the heavy financial burden the Government has placed on bingo clubs up and down the country.”