Where next after the election?

So, the votes have been counted and it is a case of ‘winner alright’ for Keir Starmer and the Labour Party in the UK. But what does that mean for the current increasingly heated debate around responsible gambling, the funding of racing, affordability checks and all the rest of it?

In the same week as a national hunt horse that has won two bumpers fetched £600,000, you’ll forgive me for putting the funding of racing to one side, and instead focusing on the responsible gambling / affordability side of things (which is what this blog is all about, after all). 

On that topic, I suspect it would be foolish to read too much into what has happened since the election. But on the other hand, we should acknowledge the current mess that exists and the general approach we can expect from a Labour government.

First the ‘good’ news. Neither Keir Starmer nor Stephanie Peacock (the new Gambling minister) appear to be mortal enemies of the gambling industry. But that, realistically, is about as far as this goes. Whilst it is true that Ms Peacock has spoken in support of British racing, and has made vaguely encouraging remarks about affordability checks, her parliamentary record as shadow gambling minister includes an awful lot of questions about gambling harm, responsible gambling and so on.

You might expect that from a member of the opposition, but it ties into the broader point that we made a month ago when looking at the party manifestos. Expect much more of a ‘public health’ approach to gambling than previously, with all that that entails. As I have said many, many times, the industry needs to think carefully about how they get ahead of this situation and control the narrative, rather than find themselves immediately on the back foot. Part of that process will almost certainly relate to affordability checks. Speaking of which…

The current state of play

I think it is fair to say that the industry seems to have got itself back into a similar mess than the one it was desperately trying to escape from only a year or so ago.

Let’s look at the current situation:

• A 6 month pilot, co-ordinated by the Gambling Commission, is about to get underway. This will be based on thresholds (for advanced checks) of losses of greater than £1,000 within a rolling 24 hours or £2,000 within 90 days.
• To the best of my knowledge, there has been no confirmation of how this will work, other than some frankly unhelpful comments from a former minister that raised more questions than answers 
• In the meantime, the BGC have launched a voluntary code, under which affordability checks that require documents kick in at losses of £25,000 in a year or £5,000 in a month (which are, of course, significantly different levels from those proposed in the whitepaper)
• But Andrew Rhodes, the head of the Gambling Commission, helpfully reminded everyone involved that “of course, operators remain under the obligation to meet other requirements to support customers at risk of harm”

In this situation, you can hardly blame operators for remaining pretty cautious about player protection. That’s certainly what we’ve heard, and it stands to reason. I don’t think “well, they hadn’t lost more than £25,000 in a year” is going to be much of a defence either during a potential audit or (more seriously) when the media spotlight inevitably falls on gambling in the future.

Nor, I suspect, will it play particularly well with the incoming Labour government. I am afraid I just don’t see the voluntary code as solving the actual problem, which is that of a small minority of players spending more on gambling than they can afford to lose. On that basis I think it will remain what it allegedly is today: a bare minimum. 

So what next? With a Labour government taking a public health approach to gambling, and the loss of a number of traditional supporters of gambling and racing within Westminster, it’s time to get serious.

I say this with the industry’s best interests at heart: sooner or later we have to bite the bullet and deliver affordability checks that make sense. That means they are:

• At a realistic level: one that doesn’t inconvenience the vast majority of punters, but that does stop serious gambling harm before it can happen. I’ll say it again: 25K in a year is too high, and doesn’t address the core issue.
• Predictable and transparent for all concerned. Punters know how and why they occur, and they are not applied arbitrarily.
• Based on actual, useful data, as opposed to guesswork (which does not bode well for the Gambling Commission pilot, based on what we have heard to date)
• As frictionless as possible. Which does not mean entirely frictionless which may be impossible, and may not be a good idea anyway.

At the risk of channelling my inner Gordon Brown, these would be my four ‘tests’ for affordability checks. And the good news is that ClearStake already meets every single one of them. All we really need at this point is clarity from the government, regulator and industry. 

While we wait (and we may be waiting a long time), there’s nothing stopping operators getting ahead of the curve. Just drop us a line and we can deliver smart, effective compliance today.