Britain's government launched proposals for the creation of 16 large UK casinos yesterday and finally axed controversial plans for the country's first Las Vegas-style supercasino.

The supercasino was set to be built in Manchester before the scheme was effectively killed off by Gordon Brown last July, shortly after he became Prime Minister.

Culture minister Andy Burnham confirmed the supercasino would not be built but gave the go-ahead for 16 smaller sites.

The government also moved to head off legal threats from Manchester and rival bidder Blackpool over its supercasino U-turn by offering them cash for regeneration.

The city of Manchester was a shock winner of the supercasino mandate after it beat off favourite Blackpool and Glasgow and London in January last year.

But the plans were wrecked two months later when senior lawmakers in Britain's upper chamber voted against the proposal, after lobbying by anti-gambling campaigners, church leaders, supporters of the Blackpool bid and gambling firms with casinos already in Manchester.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.