Is enough being done to protect young people from gambling addiction?

Ryan’s problems with gambling coincided with the arrival of smartphones and betting apps in his late teens. Suddenly, it became possible to bet on anything, anywhere in the world with the tap of a finger.

“I’d start with South American football, switch to the NFL and then of course there’s always horse racing and online slots,” he tells me.

Although at his lowest point Ryan was losing almost £4,000 a day, he became skilled at concealing the extent of his problem from family and friends.

“When you’re betting the capacity for rational thought goes out the window. But after heavy losses you get this crushing feeling of guilt, and then the awful realisation that you have the mortgage and bills to pay,” he says.

Ryan has fluctuated between bouts of binge betting and periods of complete abstinence helped by regular attendance at Gamblers Anonymous meetings.

His most recent relapse occurred in August 2021 when something as innocuous as a train cancellation fatefully left him with time to spare. After that final 11-month betting binge, Ryan, now 29, realised that he needed to seek clinical help.

For recovering gambling addicts the ubiquity of betting advertising means temptation is everywhere. Ryan says he will have to come off social media during the Cheltenham racing festival because he knows he’s likely to be bombarded with offers of free bets and other inducements to gamble.

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Research suggests that 35 per cent of people with gambling disorders receive daily incentives to gamble, compared to just 4 per cent of those not suffering gambling harm.

“You wouldn’t give a drinks voucher to an alcoholic to tempt them into a pub when you know they’re going to get drunk. So why would you give a free bet to someone who you know has no control over what they do next?” asks Ryan.

The UK gambling industry has revenues of £14bn a year – £1.5bn of which is ploughed back into advertising.

According to research from the National Centre for Social Research from last year, The “top 10 per cent” of gamblers, defined by volume bet, bring in 79 per cent of revenue.

The government has been promising an urgent review of the UK’s outdated gambling law since 2019. But delays in the legislative timetable – caused first by Covid, and then 2022’s carousel of prime ministers – means that the government’s long-promised white paper is only now being finalised.

The UK gambling industry is represented by the Betting and Gaming Council. It’s a single industry body. The BGC says that it wants to see new safeguards to protect those at harm without diminishing the experience for customers who “gamble responsibly”.

The public health messaging around gambling is primarily paid for by the gambling industry through a voluntary levy. Hence industry-backed slogans like “When the fun stops, stop”.

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If only it were that simply says, Professor Henrietta Bowden-Jones: “Relying on voluntary donation to tackle gambling addiction is a little like taking money from tobacco companies to research lung cancer,” she says. Since 2008, when she founded and became director of the National Problem Gambling Clinic in London, Bowden-Jones has been trying to treat the casualties of the digital gambling age. “Gambling addiction is a horrible disease,” Bowden-Jones says.

Since his self-referral to the clinic, Ryan tells me that discovering more about the neuroscience behind his gambling disorder has been especially helpful.

Gambling rewires the brain by flooding it with so much dopamine that the body soon learns to protect itself; it reduces the bliss hormones receptors so that they become less responsive to its effects. As dopamine tolerance builds, more risk is required to recreate those first highs. Problem gambling is a neurological disorder where the brain experiences withdrawal symptoms and craves betting behaviours just to get back to its altered new normal.

These days, my 19-year-old son doesn’t confide in me all that often, but when he came home from his first term at university he admitted how shocked he was at just how many of his new friends were spending serious time and money on gambling apps. It’s the reason I wanted to write this article.

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When I mention this to Bowden-Jones she explains that it’s an all too familiar story.

“We see a lot of students in the young adults clinic that supports 16-25-year-olds. It’s the first time they’re away from home with their own cash and no parental supervision; some of them can’t handle it. They’re very young and being treated like adults although at some level they’re not adults yet because the maturation of the frontal lobes hasn’t yet occurred, they’re less able to postpone gratification and control impulsivity.”

The thrill-seeking behaviour of young people is believed to make them especially vulnerable to gambling disorders. But from the age of 18, the UK betting industry clearly sees them as fair game. In a process its critics have compared to grooming, gambling companies target them relentlessly. In one survey, 72.4 per cent of 18-24-year-olds said they see gambling advertising at least once per week on their social media feed.

Bowden-Jones explains that by 2024 there will be a total of 15 similar regional clinics to cope with the gambling public health crisis. Ryan has been part of a cognitive behavioural therapy programme that typically lasts 8 to 12 weeks. Patients are taught to recognise their triggers and learn to reframe their thinking processes around gambling, as well as to replace toxic behaviours with healthy ones.

Although the network will be able to field thousands of referrals each year, it’s still likely to be the tip of the iceberg. It’s estimated that only 5 per cent of gambling addicts seek the kind of evidence-backed treatment programme that Ryan experienced.

According to Bowden-Jones, that’s because, unlike drink or drug problems, problem gamblers become skilled at concealing their behaviours.

“You end up isolated from your family and friends because you’ve taken money. Or you lose your job because you’ve tried to take money from your employer. Being a problem gambler is extremely isolating,” she says.

A 2020 YouGov prevalence study estimated up to 2.7 per cent of adults in Great Britain, or nearly 1.4 million people, were problem gamblers – but the government’s Gambling Commission survey put the rate at 0.2 per cent. The true figure is likely to be somewhere in between.

Without a prevalence study designed and carried out by senior clinicians, it’s impossible to gauge the scale of the problem.

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In theory, the betting industry’s voluntary levy means that there is a £100m pot available to support programmes and research into problem gambling. But without proper integration into existing NHS services, or the independent evaluation of the long-term impact of funding decisions, or coordinated oversight from the research councils, gambling reformers regard it as a meaningless industry gesture.

In common with many of the gambling reform campaign groups, Bowden-Jones believes that the new gambling act must make provision for a significant statutory levy on industry profits to set up a panel to oversee independent research, education and treatment.

By the time they’re referred to the clinic, most patients like Ryan have endured a turbulent time in their twenties – and it’s typically present in their early- or mid-thirties.

Bowden-Jones tells me that, paradoxically, the very technology that has made gambling such a public health crisis is helping to provide the first line of defence for gamblers in recovery.

Patients self-exclude from gambling websites, but also use software that prevent them from accessing other platforms; so in effect, they’re double blocked. They’re also advised to switch to a bank that doesn’t permit transactions with betting firms. Some patients also have salaries redirected to parents or spouses for safekeeping.

Now if a patient lapses, the only way they can gamble is to get cash back from a retail transaction and then go into a high street betting shop to place the bet physically.

Despite its many delays, Bowden-Jones still declares herself “optimistic” that the government’s white paper will propose meaningful change.

Founded in 2018, Gambling with Lives (GwL) is an influential group set up by families who have lost loved ones to gambling-related suicide. It’s lobbying hard for regulatory reform of the gambling industry.

In line with the Gambling with Lives campaign, Bowden-Jones also wants to see stringent affordability checks, limited stakes and slower play speeds on online slot machines and data transparency on problem betting. She also wants the new legislation to ban gambling advertising and inducements like free bets.

On 1 March, Bowden-Jones was in attendance with the Gambling with Lives families for a meeting at the House of Commons to hear the minister for culture, Lucy Frazer, reassure the group that she was “particularly conscious of the vulnerability of young people”.

Given that Frazer is the twelfth minister responsible for gambling reform that the GwL have worked with over the last five years, perhaps some frustration was understandable when she hinted at a further delay so that she could “listen and learn”.

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For Annie Ashton, who lost her husband Luke in April 2021, it sounded like just more dither and delay: “It’s the same thing they say every time: ‘There’s a lot to look at and it’s going to take time’. I’m sick of hearing it. It’s been four years since they promised to reform, and Luke died two years ago.”

Over the course of this parliament, Conservative and Labour MPs have declared more than £160,000 in donations or gifts from gambling firms and related businesses. They have also declared outside earnings from second jobs in the gambling industry of nearly £110,000.

When those figures were released in January as part of the Westminster Accounts resource published by Tortoise in partnership with Sky, there were fears among campaign groups that when the white paper was finally released there was risk it could be diluted.

However, the GwL has succeeded in winning support from across the political spectrum. As a prominent member of the all-party parliamentary group into gambling-related harm, Iain Duncan Smith made an impassioned plea for regulation, telling the meeting: “Enough; we are dealing frankly with... companies whose business model is built on destroying lives.”

It’s hoped that the white paper will finally be published just before the Easter recess.

Perhaps the starkest message came from Liz Richie, the mother of Jack Ritchie who died by suicide in 2017, aged just 24. He had spent the last seven years of his life struggling with his gambling disorder.

As a founding member of GwL his mother has been campaigning to reform the UK’s outdated gambling laws ever since. “To the abusers and their facilitators we say: we see you, and what you are doing,” she says.

If you are experiencing feelings of distress, or are struggling to cope, you can speak to the Samaritans, in confidence, on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email jo@samaritans.org, or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch.

If you are based in the USA, and you or someone you know needs mental health assistance right now, call the National Suicide Prevention Helpline on 1-800-273-TALK (8255). This is a free, confidential crisis hotline that is available to everyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

If you are in another country, you can go to www.befrienders.org to find a helpline near you.