Bookmakers cheer delay to new betting machine limits

Last month the government cut the maximum stake on fixed-odds betting terminals from £100 to £2, with sports minister Tracy Crouch saying it was designed to reduce the potential for large losses and "the risk of harm to both the player and wider communities".

Bookmakers warned the limit could lead to thousands of outlets closing, although the investors seemed to take this doomsday warning with a large pinch of sale as shares in all the major firms rose.

According a report in The Times on Friday, bookies have convinced the Treasury - which has always been worried about the hit to tax receipts from a lower stake - that they need more time to reprogram the terminals.

The delay is thought to allow the industry, which was already celebrating the recent lifting of a ban on sports betting in the US, to earn a further £4bn from the machines dubbed the 'crack cocaine of gambling'.

A spokesman for the Campaign for Fairer Gambling said: “Unbelievably, the Treasury thinks it takes two years for the bookmakers to run a software update. Somehow ministers have contrived to give the bookies a longer transition period than it will take to negotiate Brexit.”