Brown says that Labour can resume its ‘historic role and take 500,000 children out of poverty without dropping manifesto commitments’.
Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown has urged the Labour government to hike gambling taxes in order to tackle child poverty.
It comes amid predictions that child poverty in the UK is due to hit a record 4.8 million children by 2029.
Writing in the Guardian, Brown said that Labour can resume its ‘historic role and take 500,000 children out of poverty without dropping manifesto commitments’.
The former Labour leader has called on Chancellor Rachel Reeves to hike gambling taxes so she can lift benefit restrictions at her autumn Budget. He told the BBC Britain was facing a “social crisis” with a growing need to take children out of poverty.
Hiking taxes on the “undertaxed” gambling industry was “by far the most cost-effective way” for the chancellor to do this, he argued.
Brown writes in the Guardian: “Excluding the lottery, betting and gaming was an £11.5bn sector last year that incurred only £2.5bn in tax. As much as £3bn extra can be raised from taxing it properly. Remote gaming duty (effectively the tax on online slots games) is about 35% in the Netherlands, 40% in Austria, 50% in Pennsylvania and 57% in tax haven Delaware, two of the few US states where it is legal. Yet the same activity is taxed at just 21% in the UK, raising only £1bn. Applying a 50% levy – much less than the 80% tax on cigarettes and the 70% tax on whisky – would raise £1.6bn more. Raising the general betting duty on bookmakers’ profits from 15% to 25% could generate an additional £450m, after returning £100m as additional support to boost the horseracing industry.”
He goes on to add: “Gambling levies aren’t the only source of revenue that could pay to alleviate child poverty. But this should be one straightforward budget choice. The government can fulfil today’s unmet needs by taxing an undertaxed sector. Gambling won’t build our country for the next generation, but children, freed from poverty, will.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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