Gambling Advertising

Lord Vaizey of Didcot Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vaizey of Didcot (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as sitting on the advisory board of Sisal, as part of its National Lottery bid—but also, amazingly, I am part of the Behavioural Insights Team advisory panel, looking at problem gambling. I come here not to defend the gambling industry but to defend public service broadcasters—and my noble friend the Minister will know that I am a stuck record on this issue.

Bizarrely, I have had a long association, on and off, with the gambling industry—I say “bizarrely” because I do not gamble at all. But long before I became an MP I worked with Rank, when the Labour Government were proposing super-casinos, and indeed with Victor Chandler when he went offshore to Gibraltar. So, amazingly, I know a bit about it—but not as much as noble Lords who have already spoken.

The point that I want to make as simply as I can is the same point I made when we debated junk food adverts—that I wish the Government and, indeed, many noble Lords would not simply reach for a ban on television advertising as somehow a solution to the problem of problem gambling or indeed of obesity. We need a much more sophisticated and comprehensive approach, and where we can find common ground is to urge the Government to spur themselves into action to provide a comprehensive approach to dealing with problem gambling or gambling excesses. For example, I strongly supported the ban on FOBTs that came into play. To echo what my noble friend Lord Bethell said, I spoke to somebody in the gambling industry who had urged the industry to take action itself, saying that otherwise the Government would take action for it— and the industry did not, and the Government quite rightly did.

So when we consider how to tackle issues such as problem gambling, and indeed the excesses of some gambling companies, please can we look at the online advertising environment, which is too often forgotten in this debate? Television advertising makes far less impact—if you accept that there is an impact—than the much more sophisticated targeting of people, based on their data and visits to websites, that you find online.

Look at the way gambling companies design their sites, and regulate that to ensure that they do not design sites that are attractive and designed to keep you coming back for more. Look at what innovative new banks such as Monzo have done, allowing people to fix their credit card and current accounts so that they cannot spend money on gambling sites. Work with the responsible gambling companies when they are doing the right thing. I read in the paper today, in the context of Flutter releasing its annual results, that it is apparently linking bonuses for its employees to reducing problem gambling.

So, in the short amount of time each of us is allowed, my simple and heartfelt plea is: please do not keep relentlessly targeting our poor public service broadcasters, which are competing against the likes of Netflix and Disney+, and instead produce a much more sophisticated and comprehensive plan to reduce problem gambling.