SUPERCASINO

27th Feb 2008

When the winning bid for the original supercasino was announced, I was very pleased that it was not the Millennium Dome. London, and Greenwich in particular, had been spared the magnet for crime that such a supercasino would inevitably become. Neither did I buy the argument that the supercasino would provide employment. This was always a tenuous argument not backed up by sensible assumptions.Now we hear that there will be no supercasino anywhere in the country as the Manchester project is to be shelved. This is even better news. Gambling causes harm. Those who can least afford it often suffer most. It is not something government should encourage. Gordon Brown and Andy Burnham have made the right decision - undoing a decision which should never have been taken.