Interesting that the big betting companies are raising the % age of their annual profits from 0.1% to 1% to assist the effects of gambling. British gamblers currently lose, not bet, £13 billion per year. There are more than 2 million people in UK addicted to gambling and many suicides a year caused by gambling addiction. They banned tabacco sponsorship and advertising in sport, should they do the same with gambling. It will have a major impact on football if they do. The dilemma is balancing a moral issue against England having the greatest financed football in the world.
The betting advertising on TV seems to be so prevalent. And surely "free" bets should be outlawed as they lure people in. I ve never bet online and only do occasionally ( maybe the Grand National or at the Crucible) but I could easily see hie addictive it could be Theyve tightened up on slot machines after all
Free bets should not be outlawed. They should be made more abundant for people like me who do matched betting.
It's the FOBTs that were the major problem. I've seen lives ruined by those things. The reduction from £100 a spin to £2 a spin maximum bet is the best thing to happen to the industry in years. Blokes who would have a fiver accumulator on a Saturday then feeding twenty quid notes into a machine time after time is a sickening sight.
Nobody is asking for betting to be banned. I suggest you learn to read before you try being so callous.
I have an account with betfair. Put £5 in about 15 years ago and I'm still running off my original £5. I'm lucky. Betting isn't an addiction I'm susceptible to. There are those that aren't. Advertising to drag people into it should be banned in my opinion.
I never said they were. I was just taking things to illogical extremes. I suggest you learn to read before you try being so offended.
No you weren’t. You were being callous and facetious as per usual. People are asking for vulnerable people to not have it advertised to them in a regulatory manner. Same rules already apply to alcohol and smoking. As someone who has had family members and friends afflicted with gambling addiction and seen the damage first hand I suggest you grow up. Tedious straw man reductio ad absurdism does not reinforce your point FYI
As a rule i only put 50p on accies on a saturday afternoon. And thats not a regular occurence. I know people who've spent their last £20 in betfred etc. and hope theyll get 300 quid so their bills can be paid. It's supposed to be a bit of fun but its sick the way they can exploit hard up people. All we get is a half hearted 'when the fun stops stop'.
What rules apply to alcohol? It's perfectly legal for alcohol brands to sponsor football clubs, advertise in the ground and advertise during live coverage? Where do we draw the line? Obesity is definitely a problem and apparently so is food addiction. Should Dominos be heavily regulated too?
I will say, as bat of a rep as sky get, skybet are probably the best I’ve seen for actually enforcing the play within your limits mantra in their adverts.
Nanny statism at its finest. Where do we draw the line? Alcohol and obesity cause hundreds or thousand times more deaths per year than suicides linked to gambling addiction. Shall we ban them advertising? I think McDonald’s and fosters etc might have a word or two about that. But let’s say we ban all of them - and more things which can effect health in different ways. If so, what will be advertised at all? You can’t fund itv, channel 4 and the other free to view solely on adverts for Sun life over 50 plans. Gambling addiction is a serious ailment. Of course it is. That doesn’t mean however that gambling should be blanket banned (I know nobody suggested this) - and so the differing and competing betting companies should be allowed to advertise their brand in a competitive market.
I wonder if there is any tangible link between austerity/impoverishment of large swathes of the country and increase in gambling problems just as I wonder if there is a similar link leading to knife crime, drugs, increased racism etc.. Is it symptomatic of a greater issue confronting society? No answer, just a thought.
I would suggest that austerity led to gambling rather than gambling leading to austerity for the general public - desperation chasing hope. Global bankers ‘gambling’ certainly led to the issue though. That said we’ve not needed to live in austerity for years. It was a political choice, not a necessity.
I think applying bans to social problems only drive the issue underground and leave it open to further and much darker issues involving organised crime. The US tried it for 13 years from 1920 to 1933 with no success whatsoever. During which time the level of related violent crime increased out of control. Education is the key.