Gambling-related Harms

Lord Robathan Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans for his tireless concentration on problem gambling and for continuing to raise the issue. I do not agree with everything he says, but I think he has done extremely well, and I am delighted that we have this debate.

I shall start with a confession, or should I say a declaration of interest, in that I gamble: I bet. In April, I won on the Grand National; Rachael Blackmore, on Minella Times, was the first female jockey to win the race, and I was delighted. I won quite a lot on the Cameron leadership campaign, on the referendum result and on the 2015 election, although sadly I have not yet recouped the rather large loss—a very large loss—I made on the only spread bet I will ever take part in, which was on the 2005 election; I learned my lesson. We did not do frightfully well. My wife, I am delighted to say, has now forgiven me.

I am not opposed to what I might term traditional, social gambling—far from it—be it on the racecourse, physically in a casino or even online. However, there has always been problem gambling: one can mention, relatively recently, the case of Lord Lucan, and many Members of this House in this past gambled away huge estates—I cannot even contemplate why they did so, but they did. Now, we have a completely different scale of gambling, largely because of the internet, and public policy has yet to catch up with this.

As this report makes clear, gambling profits were £14.2 billion in 2020. To put it another way, that is £14.2 billion of losses to punters. We have heard about the harms: financial, relationship, mental, physical, suicide, self-harm, depression, employment, educational, criminal and antisocial. There are huge costs to society, estimated at a total of £1.266 billion. How anyone can arrive at that amount is anybody’s guess; nevertheless, it is huge. I noted the right reverend Prelate said that the so-called commercial stakeholders, surprisingly, were not of the view that tackling gambling-related harm required a public health approach; rather, they would like to concentrate on individuals who are problem gamblers.

If anyone wants to look up online gambling sites, as I did this morning, they will find all sorts of interesting things. The 10 best, for instance, include Bet365 and Virgin Bet. You get an up to £200 welcome offer from Admiral Casino and you will discover, if you look into it, that the owner, or half-owner, of Bet365, Denise Coates, paid £99 million in tax in 2018. Put another way, even if the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, who talked about tax avoidance, is not entirely correct, she must have made a stonking fortune if she paid £99 million in tax in one year—probably well over 100 times more than most people in this country will ever pay. The money she made, and that all companies make, is other people’s losses and other people’s money—people who gambled and lost.

I have only one point to make. I am not in favour of banning things; I prefer to rely on individual responsibility. But I urge the Government to look very closely at online casinos and slot machine sites, where people sitting at home are pouring money down the drain—money which they can often ill afford. I particularly mention the ghastly adverts that are seen on television—and, I am sure, on social media, which I do not see so much—that encourage people, with any number of gimmicks, to lose money. The All British Casino gives you, it says, “Always 10% Cashback!”. That is interesting. Betway gives you £10 in free bets, and Paddy Power gives you £50 in free bets and 100 free spins, et cetera, et cetera. These are all financed by organisations that make £14.2 billion out of losses—losses that, very often, ill-advised punters like me have made. Will the Government please look at banning these advertisements, which can only be described as misleading and are designed to encourage people, often fairly poor people, to become poorer?

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)]

My Lords, it has been a pleasure to listen to the debate this afternoon. I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans for securing it. One of the first things I did when I joined your Lordships’ House was join the Select Committee on the Social and Economic Impact of the Gambling Industry, along with him, the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, and my noble friends Lord Smith of Hindhead and Lord Mancroft. I am pleased to have the opportunity early on in my new role to debate this issue, which I know continues to interest a great number of people in your Lordships’ House.

Public Health England’s review is a valuable contribution to our understanding of gambling-related harm and the forms it can take. It is also especially timely. It was an important commitment made following the last gambling review in 2018, and I am happy to assure the right reverend Prelate that its findings will be carefully considered in the Government’s ongoing review of the Gambling Act.

The landscape of gambling, as in many areas of life, has changed significantly since 2005, but the objective of the Act to protect children and vulnerable people from being harmed or exploited remains fundamental to the Government’s vision for the sector. Our Gambling Act review will ensure that our regulatory framework is fit for the digital age. Its objectives include making sure that all those who choose to gamble in Great Britain can do so in a safe way.

The Gambling Commission’s work to strengthen protections is continuing alongside the review. As noble Lords noted, gambling is a leisure activity for most, but it is also clear that many people and their families have their lives devastated by gambling-related harm. The Government are clear that gambling harm is a public health issue, as a number of noble Lords rightly noted, and we treat it as such.

Gambling legislation and Gambling Commission regulation are designed to keep gambling safe for the population as a whole. However, we have more specific measures and targeted interventions to give appropriate protection to children and vulnerable adults. The report shows that the problem gambling rate among adults is 0.5% and has remained stable since 2012, but it is essential that those suffering harm receive the help they need. Our National Health Service has committed to opening 15 new treatment clinics for problem gamblers by 2024, and the industry has committed £100 million for treatment over the same period.

A number of noble Lords, including the right reverend Prelate and the noble Lord, Lord Foster, mentioned the costs of gambling harm. PHE reports found that the annual economic burden of harmful gambling is approximately £1.27 billion but, as my noble friend Lord Smith of Hindhead noted, the report makes it clear that the analysis presented estimates the costs associated with, not caused by, gambling. There are complicated interactions between gambling and mental health problems and, as the report makes clear, alcohol use. Nevertheless, the costs associated with gambling harm are stark, so there is clearly important work still to be done.

As the noble Lord, Lord Foster, said, the report identifies gaps in the evidence base. One of the aims of our review is to make sure that we have high-quality evidence to support regulation. We will work with the Department of Health and Social Care and key parties to address the knowledge gaps identified in the evidence review and improve data collection. He asked whether that would include data from companies. The Gambling Commission is taking forward work on a national data repository with the aim of collecting data for use by researchers; I am pleased to say that it will include data directly from gambling operators.

One area where there is an evidence gap, as was noted by the right reverend Prelate and the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, concerns regional disparities. He will not be surprised to know that my eye alighted on the fact that the north-east had the highest prevalence of at-risk gamblers. However, I also saw that the PHE report was clear that, because of the small numbers it studied, it was not possible to determine those levels with any statistical significance, so that is one area where further evidence is needed and further research needs to be undertaken.

A number of noble Lords including the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, and my noble friend Lord Smith mentioned children. I am pleased to say that children’s gambling participation is in decline. In 2011, 23% of 11 to 16 year-olds said that they had gambled in the past seven days, while in 2019 it was 11%. However, we cannot be complacent. This is why, as my noble friend Lord Smith alluded to, we have increased the minimum age limit to buy National Lottery products to 18. We are also considering other potential measures to protect children and young people as part of our review. If the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, would like to tell me about the website he mentioned, I would be glad to look into why he was able to get through and discuss that with him in further detail.

The noble Lord also talked about online protections more generally. Significant progress has been made in recent years to make online gambling safer, including a ban on gambling on credit cards and new rules to reduce the intensity of online slot games. However, we recognise that more can be done to protect those who gamble online. Our review is looking closely at the case for greater protections for online gamblers, including protections on products and for individuals. The Gambling Commission is also working to improve how operators use data to identify customers at risk of harm and intervene.

The noble Lord, Lord Sikka, asked about the tax arrangements of gambling operators. All companies selling gambling to customers in Great Britain pay UK gambling duties wherever they are based; the remote gaming duty is 21% of gross profit.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and my noble friend Lord Robathan mentioned advertising. PHE’s evidence review did not find evidence that exposure to advertising and marketing is a risk factor for harmful gambling. However, operators must advertise responsibly. We are committed to tackling aggressive practices.

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

I should have congratulated my noble friend on his new post, by the way. If advertising does not encourage people to gamble, why are companies spending so much money on it?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

It is a competitive market and, if people choose to use their money in this way, operators are encouraging them to do it with their specific companies; as private enterprises, they are right to do that. But, as I say, operators must advertise responsibly and we are committed to tackling aggressive practices where we see them. We have called for evidence on advertising and sponsorship specifically as part of our review, and we are looking closely at the issue of sports sponsorship as part of it.

More broadly, on marketing and inducements, we have called for evidence on promotions and offers. One of the things I learned about when sitting on your Lordships’ committee was that the number of customers in VIP schemes has fallen by over 70% since the industry started following new rules on how the schemes should be run from September 2020. Gambling Commission and advertising rules already prohibit inducements which encourage customers to gamble more intensely, and operators are not allowed to market directly to those who have self-excluded or customers showing signs of vulnerability, but this is one of the areas we want to look into in the review.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, asked about loot boxes. The Government are delivering on their manifesto commitment to tackle the issue of loot boxes in video games. We ran a call for evidence last year to understand their full impact and received over 30,000 responses. We are reviewing those responses and continuing to engage with the industry to determine the most robust and proportionate solutions, and our response will set out the next steps that we intend to take.

The noble Lord, Lord Foster, and others mentioned problem gambling in the Armed Forces. The Government are vigilant to the emergence of problem gambling among those serving in our Armed Forces, which includes providing welfare support and financial awareness training. The Ministry of Defence also blocks gambling websites on its networks to reduce their accessibility. PHE’s evidence review found no association between exposure to combat situations and problem gambling, and there is a lack of longitudinal evidence to clarify whether trauma is a risk factor for harmful gambling. However, we welcome further evidence in this area as well, and are taking a close interest in the results of a recent important study from Swansea University looking at gambling participation among ex-service personnel.

The right reverend Prelate mentioned the troubling estimate of over 400 gambling-related suicides per year in the PHE studies. Of course, any suicide is a tragedy. It is important to note that the figure in the PHE report is an estimate based on two overseas studies; we do not know how many suicides in the United Kingdom are linked to gambling. The Department of Health and Social Care is working to improve our data collection and address other evidence gaps on this most important of issues. NHS England is also investing £57 million in suicide prevention through the NHS long-term plan. Investment in all areas of England by 2023-24 will support suicide prevention plans locally and establish bereavement support services. We know how serious these impacts can be.

While the gambling review is ongoing, the Government and the Gambling Commission are not waiting for it to end to take action where it is needed to make gambling safer. In the last 18 months, we have: banned gambling on credit cards; tightened restrictions on VIP schemes; raised expectations of online operators during the Covid pandemic, with increased monitoring and intervention throughout; introduced new rules to limit the intensity of online slot games; and launched a consultation on new rules for customer interaction to protect people who gamble online. The Public Health England review is therefore a timely contribution to our ongoing efforts to prevent gambling harm. It will be considered very carefully as part of our thorough review of the Gambling Act, together with all the other evidence we continue to receive. We will publish a White Paper setting out any proposals for reform and our vision for the sector in the digital age in due course.

I give my thanks again to the right reverend Prelate and all noble Lords who have spoken in today’s debate. I know they will continue to contribute to the debate in this important area.