Greene King Rule the Day on Bingo Application

Further to our earlier article concerning the applications by Greene King for an Operating Licence to authorise Bingo and consequently higher jackpot Gaming Machines , their appeal against the refusal by the Gambling Commission has been successful.

In a decision by the First Tier Tribunal on appeals by two Greene King Companies the Tribunal overturned the original decision and remitted it back to the Gambling Commission with a Direction to grant.

The Tribunal indicated that the grant of the Operating Licence did not allow Greene King to offer full commercial Bingo but would allow it to apply for premises Licence to the appropriate Licensing Authority, who would then have to consider each application in accordance with their responsibilities.

The Tribunal accepted that the Gambling Commission had refused the application to prevent applications for premises licences being made - this was said not to be a legitimate ground for refusal.

The Commission had accepted that Greene King were suitable and competent to offer the proposed gambling activities, and so the Tribunal went on to say The Commission could not then refuse the applications based on concerns relating to applications for premises licences.

The Gambling Commission is of course one of the Authorities to be served on any bingo premises licence application and as such could if it so wished raise concerns as part of that process on a case by case basis.

A link to the full judgment is here.

Clearly this case may have huge ramifications for the future of bingo in general but in particular bingo in pubs and higher jackpot gaming machines in pubs. It will be interesting to see if other operators now seek to take a similar course of action. It is clear from the judgement of the Tribunal that in the initial application process for the Operating Licence Greene King went through a rigorous application process and the Commission looked closely at the overall proposal and the detail. However we can see no reason why a well presented application for a similar Operating Licence from an organisation which is financially well run should be refused.

Susanna Fitzgerald QC appeared on behalf of Greene King and Philip Kolvin QC on behalf of the Gambling Commission.