FOI 2296-25 Betting Shops & Adult Gaming Centres
Request:
1. A summary of the number of betting shops within your jurisdiction and the corresponding number of police callouts/incidents associated with these establishments between 21st January 2024 and 21st January 2025.
2. The same data (number of premises and police callouts/incidents) for adult gaming centres over the same time period.
Response:
Searches were conducted within Northamptonshire Police to locate a summary of the number of betting shops and adult gaming centres within our jurisdiction and I can now confirm that Northamptonshire Police does not hold any information relative to your request.
Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires Northamptonshire Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which:
(a) states that fact,
(b) specifies the exemption in question and
(c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
The exemption applicable to the information requested is:
Section 12(1) – Exemption where cost of compliance exceeds appropriate limit
The information you are requesting is not held by Northamptonshire Police in any reasonably retrievable form. The only means of establishing information of the nature you are requesting would be by way of manual examination of each incident record.
It is my assessment that the cost of providing you with the information requested would exceed the 'appropriate level' as set out in the Freedom of Information (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004 (currently £450 for 'prescribed costs').
In view of the above, and in accordance with the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, please take this letter as a Refusal Notice.
You may wish to refine and resubmit your request so that it reduces the costs shown above and is then within the 'appropriate limit' shown above. If you could provide a list of all betting shops and adult gaming centres with addresses we could use a keyword search.
As with any keyword search, the search will only return exact matches. This does not account for differences in terminology and/or spelling used. Keyword searches are problematic and in no way provide accurate results or figures. If the selected key words have not been mentioned the data will not be returned.
If you would like some further information about how to proceed with your request then please contact:
Due to the different methods of recording information across 43 forces, a specific response from one constabulary should not be seen as an indication of what information could be supplied (within cost) by another. Systems used for recording these figures are not generic, nor are the procedures used locally in capturing the data. For this reason, responses between forces may differ, and should not be used for comparative purposes.