Politicians are desperate not to damage Britain's parlous finances - and that should be good news on the affordability checks front

One of the most difficult aspects of the racing and gambling industry's joint efforts to talk the UK government down off the ledge of imposing sweeping

affordability checks on punters is trying to read which faction is up and which is down in the parliamentary Conservative Party. 

There was much national media coverage last week of the so-called 'Pop Cons' (Popular Conservatives) holding a meeting in Westminster, at which such luminaries as former prime minister Liz Truss and Jacob Rees-Mogg called for an end to all sorts of policies connected to the 'Nanny State', and for government to get out of people's day-to-day lives. 

On the face of it, such sentiment on the benches of the governing party should be good news for the campaign against affordability checks, but against that there is a mountain of conflicting evidence as to what Truss's successor in Number 10 believes when it comes to matters of state intervention, and that's before anyone tries to decipher what a future Labour government might do. 

However, listening to a New Statesman discussion on the two main Westminster parties' intentions when it comes to another piece of public policy, namely attempts to curb vaping and smoking among young people, I was struck by a particularly cogent piece of analysis which suggested costs can matter more than principles at this time of a parliamentary cycle.

Both for the Conservative government, with its scrapping of the HS2 rail project, and its Labour opposition, which has now decided to remove the shiny £28 billion label from its green energy initiatives, the name of the game in an election year is to bury anything which looks like it might cost money they believe the country doesn't have.

Keir Starmer has dropped a pledge to spend £28bn on green infrastructure during a Labour first termCredit: Official photograph

And there can be no question that affordability checks would indeed do the kind of financial damage that neither party would be keen on. Both the Betting and Gaming Council and the BHA will be making the case for racing and gambling's contribution to the nation's threadbare coffers, warning that damage to them will mean reduced tax revenue for the exchequer. Indeed, the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, was reported last week to be metaphorically 'kicking the tyres' of the Gambling Review, after pleas from senior racing supporters in the House of Lords. 

At a time when Hunt is reportedly eyeing up pre-election tax cuts, while lengthening NHS waiting lists and a depleted military are making demands for extra spending, it should clearly count in racing's favour that over-zealous checks would further harm the nation’s parlous public finances.

While politicians have been known to implement policies that appear to run counter to the nation's financial wellbeing, this economic reality gives racing and its followers some hope that if common sense and principle do not prevail in the checks debate, financial self-interest may count in the sport's favour too.

Read more:

'Please, please, carefully consider the damage you are going to do to the racing industry' - Middleham's plea to Rishi Sunak 

David Redvers: affordability checks could have 'catastrophic' impact on British racing's international standing 

Affordability checks explained and how to respond to the Gambling Commission consultation

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