Lottery loser calls to even the odds

The Government is facing further pressure from the gaming industry to level the playing field with the National Lottery, which has hit the football pools and betting shops companies hard since its November launch. Zetters, the football pools company, yesterday warned that revenues had dropped 10 per cent since the lottery started. This follows last week's 95 redundancies and profit warning by Vernons, the pools company owned by Ladbroke.

The first step to try and address the problem will see Zetters revert to the old system of allocating three points for all score draws.

Zetters will not follow the lottery and other pools companies which roll-over prize money from one week to the next if there is no jackpot winner. Instead the pot of prize money will be distributed each week.

Zetters' warning coincided with the company's announcement of a 64 per cent profits improvement to £690,000 before tax for the six months to the end of September.

Turnover was £11.8m, compared with £10.7m last year. Earnings per share were 6.9p, up from 4.2p. The interim dividend is 5p, up from 4p.

Analysts said that last week's concession by the Government allowing pools companies to advertise on television had probably come too late to enable them to claw back much of the lost business.

With revenues falling, the last thing they need is the provision allowing them to spend millions on television advertising.

However, the betting shops operators yesterday launched a campaign to enable them to also advertise on television.

A spokesman for William Hill, the betting shop chain owned by Brent Walker, said: "We are in competition with the lottery and the football pools and if we are not given the same concessions as them it is unfair.

"We are apprehensive about the long term effect of the national lottery on our business. We are, after all, in the same market for gamblers."

There is a lot of corporate firepower behind the betting shop industry. It includes Bass, the biggest UK brewer and owner of Coral Racing, and Ladbroke, the biggest name in betting shops.

The off-course betting, industry, however, has won some important concessions in the last couple of years. Extended opening hours, particularly in the summer, provided a useful fillip last year.