As always, we have been working away writing on Politics Home Central Lobby to highlight the key issues in the battle against FOBTs.
Following the publication of the government's gambling review, a debate of around an hour took place on Gaming Machines and Social Responsibility following an Urgent Question from Tom Watson MP. We looked at the debate in depth after Gambling Minister Tracey Crouch MP did an excellent job of presenting the government position and encouraging participation in the new consultation.
We examined the current industry-friendly system for commissioning gambling research, which allows bookmakers and gambling operators to contribute voluntarily to GambleAware. The Campaign's perspective is that the bookies have been able to influence the research agenda thanks to this structure.
It is difficult for DCMS to argue both that gambling advertising is not causing a harmful effect, and also that responsible gambling advertising will be effective in reducing harm. With online gambling making the headlines again this month, we re-visited the discussion surrounding possible measures around online gambling and advertising.
Later in November we produced a round-up report, including the latest action from the APPG on FOBTs and the discussion surrounding the legality (or lack thereof) of FOBTs in Northern Ireland. As well as this, we looked at the refusal of the ABB to appear before the APPG group to answer questions on a KPMG report, which should have been made available for public scrutiny.
Following their recent "Raising Standards Conference", the Gambling Commission has generated a three-year strategy to raise standards in several areas. We looked in depth at this strategy and gave our expert opinion and recommendations.
You can find a full round-up of all the stories we have penned for Politics Home Central Lobby by clicking here.
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