Labour Councillors departed from official party policy to veto Mayor Rahman’s attempt to protect the borough from a gambling explosion. The shock vote came as Tower Hamlets Council met on 26th June.
The Council meeting saw Deputy Mayor Ohid Ahmed move an amendment to add a “no casino” clause to the borough’s gambling policy. Labour councillors voted the proposal down – creating a free for all for developers to bring a casino to any part of the borough. Casinos bring noise and disruption as they operate into the early hours of the morning. They are also known to attract prostitution and petty crime, as well as drawing people into all forms of gambling – which sometimes gets out of control. Why Labour Councillors should believe this would be a valuable addition to the Borough is unclear – to the audience at the Council, but also to some of its own members considering the matter on earlier occasions.
•Cllr Ann Jackson, Labour Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny committee, endorsed the “No Casino” policy at a Cabinet meeting on 13th March.
•On 30th January 2013, City & East constituency GLA member John Biggs (later chosen to be Labour’s mayoral candidate for the 2014 election) asked a formal question of London Mayor Boris Johnson entitled “Crack Cocaine of Gambling”. Biggs made a very good case for using planning law to stop the proliferation of gambling joints: “As an avid Guardian Reader, I am sure you will be aware of the report on 5th January 2013 about, to paraphrase, the apparent inverse relationship between betting shop density, and receipts, and household income. The two parliamentary constituencies with the highest ‘gross amount gambled’ are in my GLA constituency, in Bethnal Green & Bow, and West Ham, and 8 of the 10 highest nationally are in poorer parts of London (the other two are in Liverpool and Manchester). Do you share my concern about this situation and what leadership do you think we should add to this? Just as there are now policies on ‘saturation’ of licensed premises, should similar regulatory muscle apply to betting shops? It is worth noting that there are 45 betting shops in Bethnal Green & Bow, one of the smallest parliamentary constituencies in area in the UK.”
•On 11th January 2013, local MPs Rushanara Ali and Jim Fitzpatrick were among a list of Labour MPs in London who signed a letter to the Guardian entitled “Control the spread of betting shops” which included the statement: “We also believe that the best way to prevent the further clustering of betting shops is to change their planning category, giving residents and local government more say over their local high street.”
•On 5th August 2012, Labour Party Deputy Leader Harriet Harman spoke out against the Labour Government’s policy of allowing betting shops to proliferate in poorer areas. The Guardian quotes Harman stating on a Channel 4 Dispatches programme: “If we had known then what we know now [about the clustering of betting shops], we wouldn’t have allowed this, because it’s not just ruining the high street, it’s ruining people’s lives. […] Well, I think we were wrong, we have made a mistake and this result is the consequence and we need to do something about it.”
In addition to the comments of the Labour politicians above, Labour run Councils of Hackney, Slough and Barnsley have adopted a “no casino” policy.
Observers who hoped that the appointment of Cllr Sirajul Islam as Leader of the Labour Group would see a more rational approach in the Tower Hall have been disappointed. It’s just more of the same “vote against Lutfur, whatever he does” policy – even if it means doing a U-turn and standing out against what their own Party has called for.