Eyes down and look at taxes, urges Rank

MECCA Bingo owner Rank called for an overhaul of UK gambling tax yesterday in an effort to tackle a "patchwork quilt" of rates.

The company wants a flat-rate 15 per cent duty imposed across all betting and gaming activities such as bingo, poker, casino games and sports betting to simplify the system. Rank was hit by an extra 5.7 million tax bill last year after bingo duty was hiked to 22 per cent and games such as poker were brought into the casino duty regime at rates of up to 50 per cent.

Mecca saw flat like-for-like revenues in 2009, but profits were down 15 per cent due to higher bingo taxation.