Gambling: Children

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Browne of Belmont

Tuesday 15th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, that is exactly why the Gambling Commission is consulting on requiring age verification before allowing free-to-play demo games to be downloaded. However, that will apply only to games hosted by gambling operators. We are aware of the problem of games and are waiting for GambleAware to do its consultation, and we will certainly take the issue that the noble Lord has raised into account.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, the most common way in which children and young people enter the route into gambling is by the purchase of scratch cards and lottery tickets. These are prominently displayed in many outlets, and it is often difficult for the seller to determine the age of the customer. Is it not time that these cards were put behind shutters, in the same way that cigarette packets are, so as not to entice young people to enter the route of gambling?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, although there may be an intuitive link there, there is not actually conclusive evidence that that is how problem gambling starts. The other point to make is that, while I am not sure that it is a majority, a significant number of children who buy scratch cards and National Lottery-type products do it with their parents’ money and indeed with their parents actually present. The question of whether 16 and 17 year-olds should be allowed to use the National Lottery will be part of the review for the fourth competition for the next national lottery licence.

Gaming Machines and Social Responsibility

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Browne of Belmont

Thursday 17th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I take that point. I am absolutely not suggesting that today’s announcement is the end of it. We will be very specific: the Gambling Commission is looking at requiring operators to set limits on customer spending until affordability checks have been concluded and at bringing forward stricter licence requirements for gambling companies to interact with vulnerable customers. This is not something that we are just letting them get on with; it is being required of them. If a company were to break such stricter licence requirements, it could lose its licence. There would be very serious sanctions if a company did it wrong. The Gambling Commission is also examining proposals to prohibit reverse withdrawals and the use of credit cards for online gambling. We will continue to pay close attention to the operators’ progress in using behavioural data to identify problem gamblers. We are not just sitting back and saying that this is it. We are monitoring it. The Gambling Commission continues to monitor it and is putting in stricter conditions.

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, I very much welcome the Statement today and congratulate the Minister on achieving the £2 stake. We have heard that problem gamblers could now turn to online sites in a big way. Does the Minister therefore agree that this is the time for the Government to look again at introducing measures, such as those that operate in Sweden, to restrict late-night internet gambling and, as he said, ensure that only debit cards and not credit cards can be used as a means of paying the stake?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I have said that this is not the end. As an aim, we want to encourage responsible gambling, so of course we will take into account suggestions such as that from the noble Lord. We are not against gambling, but we want it to be responsible. There is opportunity to monitor it more if it is done online, because of the data that goes backwards and forwards. We will look at these things and we expect policy-making on this to be evidence-based. One thing we will do is increase the research to make sure that we have good evidence that this is a problem, as we have on FOBTs, and that the solution will achieve the result that we want.

Online Gambling

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Browne of Belmont

Thursday 23rd November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Browne of Belmont]

My Lords, I am extremely grateful to everyone, including the Minister, who has taken part in today’s debate. It has been an excellent debate, with support right across the House. I do not think that anyone could have failed to be moved by all the contributions. I find myself at the conclusion with a strong sense that, to coin a phrase, something must be done.

I am grateful to the Minister for setting out what has been done, but the Government should not underestimate the level of public concern and I hope they will mediate on the political significance of the recent evidence from the Gambling Commission. Public faith in gambling has fallen dramatically in the past nine years. While I certainly did not hear complacency in the Minister’s response, I am not totally convinced that the Government are fully seized of the importance of this issue.

There is a mismatch between the significant technological possibilities for enhancing online gambling and the current proposals in the DCMS consultation. I very much hope that the Minister and the Secretary of State will take away all the excellent proposals that have been made in today’s debate and use them in the current consultation process. I hope that they will accept that while the current consultation proposals for online gambling are good as far as they go, they need to go further. I hope that when they respond to the consultation they make clear their determination not to allow multiple individual self-exclusion mechanisms to continue to exist but mandate their replacement with GAMSTOP. I hope that they will prohibit the marketing of gambling games to children and, even more importantly, prevent children’s access to such games through age verification. I hope that they will introduce a statutory level of at least 0.8% and that they will end the lending of money for gambling through credit cards. I hope that they will look at prohibiting online betting between midnight and 6 am.

I have listened very carefully to the Minister, but I do not think he responded to my specific request for a meeting with himself, GAMSTOP, the Gambling Commission and problem gamblers.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I am very happy to take that request back to the department and put it before the Minister responsible for gambling.

[Lord Browne of Belmont]

I welcome that. Finally, I think there is a lot more work to be done. As we do it, we should not forget Joshua Jones, Omair Abbas, Adam Billing and, back home, Lewis Keogh, and their families. We should seek to build a public policy framework that means that their suffering will not be repeated by others.

Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (Investigations: Code of Practice) (England and Wales and Northern Ireland) Order 2016

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Browne of Belmont

Wednesday 10th February 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Browne of Belmont (DUP)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his comprehensive explanation of the orders. I strongly support the measures contained in the five orders which he has presented to the Committee today. I certainly do not wish to prolong the Committee’s deliberations unnecessarily, so I will not discuss the technical complexities of the legislation in detail. Overall, it appears that the new powers granted to the prosecuting authorities will be effective in ensuring that the law is enforced by removing, as far as possible, any possibility of evasion. At the same time, provision is made for the supervision of the operation of the new rules by the appropriate authorities. In Northern Ireland, for example, I am thinking of the role played by the Northern Ireland Policing Board.

I particularly welcome the new rules concerning the search, seizure and detention of property in Northern Ireland, set out in the eighth item on the Order Paper. It is generally accepted that, unfortunately, the number of organised crime gangs operating in Northern Ireland has increased significantly in recent years. The law enforcement authorities must have the powers to ensure that activities such as money laundering, dealing in illicit fuel and smuggling cigarettes and drugs are no longer profitable enterprises. The new powers of search and seizure should go a long way to eliminate most of the ill-gotten gains from these activities.

I congratulate the National Crime Agency on its effectiveness in tackling serious and organised crime in Northern Ireland since it began operations with full powers on 20 May 2015. Between 1 April and 30 September 2015, the agency recorded 29 disruptions against organised crime groups and high-priority threats in Northern Ireland. It will be fully engaged in delivering the commitment outlined in A Fresh Start: The Stormont Agreement and Implementation Plan.

Does the Minister agree that, in the light of the recent appalling gang-related murders in Dublin, it is essential that the law enforcement authorities in the Republic of Ireland agree to co-operate fully with those in Northern Ireland in taking all necessary steps to bring to an end the cross-border operations of criminal gangs? I fully support these orders and I believe that they will go a long way to thwart the activities of criminal gangs throughout the United Kingdom.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have contributed to the debate. I am grateful for the comments from the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Belmont, which reinforce the comments of Northern Ireland Members in the other place when these orders were scrutinised in Committee there. I agree with him that law enforcement agencies should co-ordinate cross-border; that applies not only to the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland but further abroad as well, in the rest of Europe. As with so many other things, the world is getting to be a small place, and that includes organised crime so it is essential that effective co-operation takes place.

I am grateful for the support from the noble Lord, Lord Rosser. He asks whether the orders are intended to increase revenue. We are talking about seizing the proceeds of crime, so obviously if the orders are more effective then we will increase revenue, though it is difficult to say exactly by how much.

The wider package of measures that we are commencing across the UK is mostly to do with ensuring that property is available to be recovered, and increasing the effectiveness of tools that are used to enforce the orders made by the courts. I will not go through all those orders and powers, but I think that there has been general support, not just today but previously when they were passed.

On numbers, I cannot predict what we anticipate because, after all, this is covering the proceeds of crime so it is difficult to estimate what crime is going to take place. However, I can say that in 2014-15 we recovered £199 million, which is the best ever total, and in addition denied criminals access to over £441 million in assets. Hopefully, these measures will improve that.

I think that covers most of the points, except for the noble Lord’s comments about the Attorney-General’s order. Obviously that was written by lawyers for lawyers, so perhaps I can leave it at that.

This has been a useful debate. As I say, I welcome the cross-party support. The effect of serious and organised crime can be felt in communities right across the country. The truth is that it can and does wreck the lives of ordinary people. The powers have been agreed and widely supported and these orders will bring all those codes of practice into effect, thus providing effective guidance safeguards as well as enabling the full commencement of the POCA amendments throughout the UK, as described in my opening speech. I ask noble Lords that these orders be agreed to, and I beg to move.