Labour Takes Donation from Online Gambling

September 4, 2007

Many are wondering just whose side Gordon Brown is on these days – having come out against the supercasino but still taking money from online gambling venues. Brown has been very vocal in his condemnation of the online casinos and online gambling venues that have proliferated the web in the UK.

However, the Labour party has just accepted a donation of £150,000 from the online gambling company Bet 365. The quarterly figures for the Electoral Commission show the online gambling company’s donation by Peter Coates. Some say that it is rather hard for Brown to go on a crusade about stopping betting when he is basically supporting online gambling.

They say that his talk of stopping problem betting is just that – a bunch of talk. They say that he is taking the “moral high ground” over betting and supercasinos, while taking money from online gambling sources.

Labour said that they had accepted donations from several sources, as Tony Blair had left them £20m in the red. They would need to call on major donors to help them out with the next campaign as they will be unable to mount a general election campaign in October without more funding.

They said that they are in a “challenging position” financially, but they expect it to turn around over the next few months. The Tories are already looking to be in better financial shape, so a general election should not be a problem for the group.



Back to September 2007 Archive.