Fylde Coast MP’s Joan Humble, Gordon Marsden, and Ben Wallace have a 45-minute meeting scheduled with Mrs Jowell at her Westminster offices and are hoping to persuade her not to accept the UK Casino Advisory Panel’s recommendation that the UK's first regional casino licence be awarded to Manchester.
One of the key concerns will be to urge Jowell to allow MP’s to have two separate votes when the recommendations come to Parliament, which is expected to be later this month.
The idea is to get the vote on the regional casino licence separated from the vote to confirm the locations of the 16 other smaller casinos. That would give MP’s the chance to go forward with the recommendations for the smaller casinos while contesting the surprise recommendation of Manchester for the regional casino.
Mr Marsden said he was confident that Mrs Jowell would listen to what they had to say.