Keir Starmer must stop foreign firms destroying UK £8bn industry before it’s game over

It’s one of the most profitable British success stories in the post-industrial era - and one that many Brits probably aren’t even aware of because we never shout about it.

Gaming has never been bigger and the UK is for once leading the charge on the world stage here. At least for now, because foreign firms are putting the whole thing at risk, with British jobs and consumer spending squarely in their crosshairs.

The UK games industry was worth £8.76bn in 2025 according to UK gaming industry body UKIE and grew 7.4% year-on-year.

In fact, gaming is worth nearly eight times more than the UK’s fishing industry (£1.16bn), and beats TV & film (£2.8bn), dairy (£5.7bn), and music (£8bn), yet fails to attract one millionth of the attention as any of these despite generating more for our economy.

Not only that, but the UK’s outsized contribution to gaming worldwide is frankly unmatched. The UK is responsible for the juggernaut that is Grand Theft Auto, which was born from Rockstar North in Scotland and is probably the most important game series today. Its upcoming GTA VI is expected to generate up to £3bn in sales on its first day this November.

The UK also houses Playground Games, makers of Forza Horizon, the best-selling Xbox title this year, and Codemasters, behind the best-selling F1 game series, and many, many more besides. All of these firms secure hundreds and in some cases thousands of UK jobs and put Britain firmly on the global stage.

But that could all be unplugged if consumers' rights aren't protected.

Japanese firm Sony this week announced it is ending production of game discs from 2028, citing ‘shifting’ consumer trends for its best-selling PS5 console and upcoming PS6, which is widely tipped to launch next year. The decision has sparked a petition with 200,000 signatures.

In the same week, PlayStation announced it was removing purchased digital content from account holders due to a licence agreement with Studio Canal ending. These were not streaming subscriptions. They weren’t rented copies. These were movies that people paid full price for that were yoinked back out of people’s accounts, with no refunds given.

PlayStation consumers will have no choice in future but to buy games only through the PlayStation online store, or buy a digital copy through retail containing a code… to redeem only on PlayStation’s online store. It means Sony will effectively control the entire market for its game sales and, at the same time, can remove your purchased games at any time. And the moment you download a game, even if you haven’t played it, you’re not allowed a refund.

And US-owned Xbox is being tipped to follow suit and abolish disc games with its next console, while also retaining the right to remove any purchased games from your account. Even Steam, the most popular digital store on PC, warns that you’re only buying a ‘licence’, which it says can be revoked, not proper ownership. Why do we allow this?

Forecasts for the next generation of consoles look bleak. The PS5 price has gone up from £449 in 2019 to £569 today, and the PS6 is now tipped by industry insiders to cost around $1,000 to make. The Xbox Series X launched at £450 and is now £640 and the next Xbox isn’t expected to be below four figures either.

This is thanks to AI data centres around the world gobbling up computer components, leading to a shortage which is making prices spiral. Even Nintendo cannot escape the AI nightmare, as it has also announced a price rise for its new Nintendo Switch 2 console set to take effect this September, while the prices of PCs, PC parts, laptops and tablets have all exploded. For example, I bought a 2TB SSD memory drive in 2023 for £165. That same stick now costs £269.

Just this week, it was reported that AI data centres will be given special exemption from planning rules, meaning they can be waved through in the face of any local objections. But chasing this new trend could come at the cost of one of the UK’s biggest success stories, as each data centre, which run off consumer grade components (as well as drinking water), help push up gaming prices even higher and potentially damages prospects for this established British industry.

Taken together, the UK’s vital games industry could be heading for a crash as prices rise and options reduce.

And if we’re willing to go to war with the EU over fishing, and fight the corner for farmers over the price of milk, then we should damn well be battling to save the games industry from a collapse in consumer spending and the resulting decimation of jobs and reduced tax take that follows.

Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves, and the incoming Andy Burnham must step up their game. They must rework our arcane digital rights laws which are not fit for 2026, and protect consumers from digital monopolies in a future disc-free world. They must ensure a right to digital refunds, guarantee that any consumers can buy from more than one marketplace and ensure AI data centres don’t get built at the cost of every other industry - or it could be game over.