Gambling News by Gambling Headquarters

As The Gazette launches its most important ever campaign - to save Blackpool's casino and regeneration dreams - SHELAGH PARKINSON and NICK HYDE speak to those who believe it is vital we keep fighting That is message as the dust settles on the resort's supercasino snub. Amazement, anger, bewilderment - the list is endless when trying to describe the sense of feeling against what many see as a gross injustice. "Blackpool had the best case, proved it and still lost" is a sentiment shared by a town in shock at the decision to award the lucrative prize to Manchester. Our North West neighbours were, said the CAP, the best bet on all counts - for helping assist regeneration of a poor district and as the social impact test bed for Las Vegas-style glitz and gambling. Not so, say MPs, council leaders and Gazette readers who today made an 11th hour appeal to Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell to think again ahead of the crucial Parliamentary vote on the matter. Blackpool will lose millions in potential regeneration revenue by the decision to hand the one-and-only licence to a modern, cosmopolitan city already having benefited from £2bn of private sector investment in the last five years.The reason for such strong support for Blackpool's case locally comes from the 180-page CAP report - the same one which so publically damned the resort's bid. It stated the casino was not enough to boost Blackpool's fortunes, would not be instrumental in its rebirth and claimed Blackpool was not in terminal decline. The Fylde's four MPs have branded the Casino Advisory Panel report as littered with "inconsistencies" and "contradictions". They have accused the panel of missing the point when it came to assessing the "catalystic potential" of the super casino to trigger further massive investment in Blackpool. They also argue the decision to locate the development in a residential area of Manchester is completely at odds with previous recommendations that such premises are not located close to people's homes. Blackpool Council chief executive Steve Weaver and his team are now formulting their official response to the panel's ruling. But in Westminster, the Fylde's four MPs are already calling for a full debate on the issue. Blackpool North and Fleetwood MP Joan Humble said: "The panel report says a single casino will not regenerate our town, but they are ignoring the effect the casino would have on pulling in other private sector investment to Blackpool. "We have always referred to the casino as a catalyst yet the panel doesn't take that as an issue. "Of particular concern to me is the fact that they don't believe our proposal would represent the best test for social impact because the customers would be visitors who would then go home. "But that was always one of the most positive parts of our proposals that a destination casino in a resort like Blackpool would have a minimal effect on the impact of problem gambling." Blackpool South MP Gordon Marsden accused the panel of systematically failing to adhere to the remit given to them. He said: "There are serious questions to be asked about the inconsistencies within the report. "Firstly, Blackpool is criticised in that it wouldn't be able to handle so-called doorstep gambling because the proposal site was in a residential area, and yet the committee seem to have passed without comment the fact they are proposing to site it in one of the most deprived areas of East Manchester. "Secondly, they appear to have paid no attention whatsoever to the instructions Parliament gave them to look at the regional context of the development. We had the support of the Northwest Regional Development Agency but that seems to have been ignored." Fylde MP Michael Jack added: "The thing that surprised me was the emphasis given to the social implications of gambling and therefore the reference to Manchester as the best test bed, which was a fundamental shift from the main point which I think everyone thought was the impact of this kind of development on regeneration.