Estates Gazette

6/10/2007

Manchester council chief Sir Howard Bernstein is leading a final campaign to convince Gordon Brown that a super-casino is the only way to revive a rundown area of the city. David Quinn reports

After a run of bad luck, Manchester’s hopes of becoming home to the UK’s first super-casino looked dead and buried this summer. Not so, say the city’s council leaders, who are this week launching a fight to secure the £250m entertainment scheme which they believe can – and must – be delivered.

It was in January that the independent Casino Advisory Panel surprised almost everyone by recommending Manchester over favourites Blackpool and the Millennium Dome in east London as the location for the UK’s sole super-casino. But since then, odds against its delivery have lengthened so much that the media have all but written off the development.

Key factors in the super-casino’s downfall were its rejection in the Lords in March (see panel, p87) and, crucially, the apparent antipathy of new prime minister Gordon Brown. When, after finally getting the keys to number 10, the Presbyterian Brown called for a review of the use of super-casinos as a means of delivering regeneration it was seen as the death knell for the initiative. In fact, what Brown had actually said on 11 July was that the project would be “subject to reflection”.

Media commentators suggest that the prime minister is keen to wash his hands of the super-casino because it plays badly in Daily Mail-reading Middle England, which Brown’s strategists are desperate to woo ahead of a possible late-autumn election.

But, with little fanfare, Brown instigated the inter-departmental review he promised. Manchester is a “constructive participant” in the review, which is led by the Department of Communities and Local Government and is expected to declare its findings within weeks. Brown is not expected to make a final decision until after an election, however, for fear of the political fallout.

For Sir Howard Bernstein, chief executive of Manchester city council, the fact that the review is happening at all is evidence that the government has an open mind about the future of the scheme. “There was speculation in the press about what was on the prime minister’s mind [following the July statement] but it’s clear that he wants a period of time to reflect,” says Bernstein.

“There’s no alternative”

The council’s contribution is a renewed drive to claw back the scheme it views as a hard-won prize. Bernstein rejects any suggestion that it should forget the super-casino and put its energies into alternative uses for the site it had prepared for the scheme at Sportcity in east Manchester.

“Manchester remains committed to supporting this scheme, and we’ll work hard with the government to make sure it’s delivered,” says Bernstein.

“Our submission is that there is no alternative strategy and there is no type of development, other than a super-casino, which can deliver the same level of benefit.”
To make its case, the council submitted a dossier, compiled by KPMG, listing a series of possible alternative uses for the cleared Sportcity site – all of which the dossier then pulls apart.

Casino-free leisure schemes are said to be “uneconomic”. Residential development is described as “antithetical to the role and function of the site”. Offices are “not sustainable without very significant public funding support”, while speculative development is described as “not realistic”. But the super-casino-led scheme meets with favour and is described as “wholly consistent with spatial and regeneration strategies”.

According to the dossier: “It is unlikely that there is any alternative use which can achieve the [regeneration] outcomes in east Manchester with no public subsidy, and generate a positive return for further regeneration.”

While this line of argument is open to question by the government in the battle ahead, the need for regeneration in east Manchester is undisputed. The council points out that around 33,000 jobs were lost in the area during the 1970s and 1980s and that more than 90% of the area’s 62,000 residents live in neighbourhoods ranked in England’s worst 10%.

The creation of a 675,000 sq ft mixed-use scheme anchored by a 53,800 sq ft super-casino would form the next phase in the area’s regeneration, creating 3,500 jobs, injecting £250m of capital investment and attracting 1.3m visitors pa, according to the council.

However, questions have been raised from across the political spectrum about whether a giant casino with unlimited-jackpot slot machines is really what this deprived area needs. Pressure groups such as Campaign Against Super-Casino Expansion claim super-casinos create “problem gambling” and will do little to benefit deprived communities. The Archbishop of Canterbury has also voiced concerns about “the sleight of hand by which the whole business of the gambling industry has become coupled with the regeneration theme”.

Bernstein dismisses such concerns, saying a super-casino would not be harmful to the area’s residents. “We are dealing with a casino that will become part of the most regulated section of gambling in the UK,” he says. “The evidence doesn’t support people’s opposition to casinos. These facilities, if done right, can be centres for economic growth.”

Bernstein refers to the recent British Gambling Prevalence Survey 2007, conducted on behalf of the Gambling Commission by the independent National Centre for Social Research. Its key finding was that rates of problem gambling in the UK have not risen since 1999 and remain at 0.6% of the population.

He says this is “surprising” given the massive growth in the multi-million-pound online gambling industry during this period and believes it is therefore unlikely that a single super-casino in Manchester will have any significant effect on problem gambling.

Moreover, Bernstein warns that if the super-casino is not delivered, initiatives promoting responsible gambling will be set back. The council has pledged that section 106 agreements will stipulate that the successful super-casino developer must help fund gambling support groups and other such projects.

Bernstein is clearly up for a fight. “It’s going to be an entertaining process,” he chuckles. “The evidence in our favour is clear but public confidence has to be built up.”


How super-casino ball got rolling

2003 Manchester council opens competition for cleared 18.6-acre site next to City of Manchester stadium at Sportcity

2004 Kerzner International and Ask Developments selected to deliver mixed-use scheme anchored by a super-casino. Subsequently, the Gambling Act says the super-casino should be awarded by public tender, meaning Kerzner/Ask will have to re-bid in competition with other operators

2005 Gambling Act made law. One super-casino with a minimum gaming area of 53,800 sq ft will be built, alongside eight “large” and eight “small” casinos

2006 Casino Advisory Panel considers eight shortlisted locations. Blackpool and the Millennium Dome emerge as favourites

30 January 2007 CAP picks Manchester for the super-casino

28 March House of Lords rejects – by three votes – an order backing CAP’s decision to award Manchester the super-casino

11 July Prime minister Gordon Brown announces review, prompting speculation that the project is dead

6 October Manchester launches fightback as conclusion of review draws near