Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department plans to allocate funding for community-based programmes for gambling harm (a) prevention and (b) early intervention in (i) rural, (ii) hard-to-reach and (iii) other areas.

On 12 February 2025, the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) was appointed as the lead commissioning body for the prevention of gambling-related harms in England, alongside the appropriate bodies in Scotland and Wales.

OHID is progressing work on the design of the new commissioning programme, working closely with NHS England as a future treatment commissioner, and with the responsible bodies in Scotland and Wales, to ensure alignment across prevention, early intervention, and treatment, so that those in need can access the right help at the right time. Decisions on how the levy funding will be allocated will be confirmed at the earliest opportunity.