Guardian says William Hill online betting operation moving to Gibraltar

There is lots of industry gossip stating that some of the biggest bookmakers in the industry are planning to leave the UK in response to William Hill’s decision to relocate its telephone and online betting operation to Gibraltar to save on paying high UK taxes.  This of course all flies in the face of assurances from the industry in 2001 that they would remain in the UK under a special agreement with the UK government in return for tax breaks.  William Hill has said that they are now reneging on the deal as it is no longer sustainable in the current economic and technological world.  William Hill have stated that they have lost out to competitors abroad because of their loyalty to the UK government but that this situation could no longer continue without destroying their business still further.

One out, all out?

A report published on the Guardian website states that William Hill see the move to Gibraltar as damage limitation.  However industry insiders see the decision by the bookmaker to move their call centre abroad to escape the harsher UK tax system, will result in a future ‘mass exodus’ of other bookmakers looking to keep up with the Joneses. Ralph Topping ,William Hill’s Chief Executive was quoted as saying in response to questions as to why they had decided to move their operation to Gibraltar  "The people who shook hands on that deal lacked the foresight to see how the internet would develop” and "By being loyal to the UK we have seen our telephone business destroyed … We are not hanging around to see if the same will happen to online."

Tote has also been quoted in the article as stating that they are not so keen to be ‘the last man standing’.  It is also anticipated that Ladbrokes will be announcing a similar offshore future for their telephone betting operation, and if this is the case it is felt that Coral will do likewise.

Implications for the future of UK online gambling?

It remains to be seen, that if in the event of a decision by the big name UK bookmakers to relocate their telephone betting operations to ‘tax havens’, whether the future would look grim for other forms of online gambling in the UK.  The UK government may well feel that they need to recoup some of the money lost from the deficiency in tax receipts from the big bookmakers such as William Hill.  The loss of the 15% taxation previously paid by those bookmakers that leave the UK for offshore tax havens like the Isle of Man and Malta could leave other forms of gambling vulnerable to the prospect of higher taxation, this of course could have a resultant adverse taxation affect on online gambling such as bingo, casino and poker sites.