The government is set to give English councils greater powers to reject licences for betting shops, vape stores and venues with round-the-clock slot machines, as part of a drive to revive Britain's "hollowed-out" high streets. Deputy Prime Minister Andy Burnham will scrap the "aim to permit" rule, introduced under Tony Blair's 2005 gambling liberalisation, which currently restricts town halls' ability to refuse such licences, while new vape shops will need planning approval from next year and the legal definition of a vape store will be tightened to close loopholes.

New stores selling round-the-clock slot machines will also require planning consent, and police will be able to close "dodgy" barbers, vape shops and nail salons for up to a year, twice the current limit, to investigate suspected links to organised crime. The Centre for Social Justice think tank, which found Britain has lost nearly 1,800 pubs and bars while vape and tobacco shops have risen to almost 2,200 since 2016, welcomed the plans, while shadow local government secretary Sir James Cleverly blamed Labour's business rate rises for high street decline and called instead for rate cuts.