Paddy Power to Close Up to 100 More Betting Shops – 400 Jobs Lost

The challenging conditions for the UK’s betting shop estate continue to worsen, with Paddy Power confirming that they will close up to 100 more shops in their latest cost cutting exercise.

The Irish firm has already closed around 60 stores in the UK and Ireland in 2026, with the latest announcement yet another blow to the beleaguered sector.

Although Flutter, Paddy Power’s parent company, will try to redeploy affected staff, it’s possible that as many as 400 people will lose their jobs as part of the latest round of cuts.

True Cost of Tax Increases

The exact number of shop closures is yet to be confirmed, but it has been reported that as many as 100 are in the crosshairs of Flutter’s decision makers.

That would equate to approximately 20% of Paddy Power’s entire retail empire; confirming the pivot away from traditional betting shops in the wake of Gambling Tax hikes.

Although the duty on in-person bets was frozen by the then chancellor, Rachel Reeves, in her Autumn Budget in 2025, other key areas of an operator’s business were hit hard:

• Remote Gaming Duty hiked from 21% to 40%
• Remote Betting Duty increased from 15% to 25%

Firms have had to find ways to mitigate and absorb the revenues lost to the Treasury, with decreased marketing spend – including things like event sponsorship and advertising – and a reduction in betting shop numbers the most common methods utilised so far.

Material Impact

Of the new Paddy Power closures, a Flutter spokesperson commented: “The high street trading environment has been challenging for a number of years given rising costs, fierce competition, economic uncertainty and the shift to online, but we also face a material impact from the higher gambling taxes announced in last year’s UK budget.

“Unfortunately, we have had to take the extremely difficult decision to conduct this review.”

Far from being mitigated by operators, the Gambling Tax grab has had a clear impact on the financial viability of retail betting.

Betfred announced earlier this summer that they were to close 132 of their shops, while Evoke – owner of William Hill – confirmed that as many as 270 of their properties will be shuttered following a strategic review prompted by the tax changes.

And the scrutiny is unlikely to let up anytime soon, with the Prime Minister labelling betting shops as ‘dodgy businesses’ in a controversial social media post, likening them to Adult Gaming Centres and vape shops.

ARC: ‘Grave Threat to Betting’

The Arena Racing Company (ARC) operates 16 racecourses across the UK, including the iconic Doncaster, Chepstow and Royal Windsor.

Their chief executive, Martin Cruddace, has spoken of the ‘grave threat’ that the Gambling Tax hikes will have both on betting shops and the sport of horse racing.

He also warned against the proposal of the former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, to increase the tax paid on gaming machines within betting shops – a move that could see nearly 3,000 stores closed and £70 million in contributions to racing lost.

And in a direct response to Burnham’s ‘dodgy’ analysis, Cruddace said: “Licensed betting shops, staffed by trained employees operating under strict regulation, are not rogue or criminal operations which should be looked down upon or sniffed at or treated in the same way as retail premises that exist solely on slot machines.

“I fear he [Burnham] genuinely confuses a betting shop with pure machine-based retail arcades that would not know a horse if it galloped past its blacked-out front.”

It’s estimated that betting shops collectively hand £350 million to horse racing each year through Horserace Betting Levy payments, media rights and sponsorships.