Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the answer of 30 January 2020 to Question 6728 on gambling and crime, what assessment she has made of the pressure on policing the increase in cases of pathological gambling whereby people turn to crime to fund their addiction.

While there are various studies suggesting that the prevalence of problem gambling is higher in offenders than the general population, the issue of problem gambling and gambling addiction has not been raised as a specific issue during our conversations about acquisitive crime with the NPCC and others.