UKGC deputy CEO hits out at black market growth concerns
Sarah Gardner dismisses calls for lighter regulation on legal market to prevent leakage
UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) deputy CEO Sarah Gardner has pushed back on claims more regulation will lead to a rise in black-market activity.
In a speech given at a Danish Gambling Authority event this week, Gardner took the opportunity to claim these risks were being “overstated” and that the measures being put in place were key to protecting customers.
The deputy CEO pointed to safer gambling measures that had been pre-emptively put in place ahead of any potential legislative change that is anticipated to arise from the white paper review into the Gambling Act 2005.
Major UK operators including the likes of Flutter, Entain and 888 have put measures in place, including affordability measures, stake limits and deposit limits for under 25s.
Gardner proceeded to hit out at suggestions these measures were hampering the regulated market in the UK, and were directly leading to a spike in unregulated gambling.
She said: “There is an argument, sometimes made in Great Britain, that just because there are illegal sites and unregulated gambling – with no protections and bad outcomes for consumers – we should scale back or stop some of the interventions we think we need to make in the regulated market to mitigate against the risk of consumers jumping from regulated gambling into unregulated gambling.
“I cannot accept this argument. Indeed, I believe that no regulator should knowingly allow bad practices of the type we are talking about here, practices which can cause harm, to carry on in the regulated market.
“And whilst we – like you – have a level of concern about illegal online gambling, and it will always be an important focus for us, we have no time for those risks being overstated, without credible evidence, either,” she added.
Gardner proceeded to touch on the white paper, indicating that the regulator was still not fully abreast of what details could arise from the document.
She continued: “Announced by the British government in December 2020, we have supported our sponsoring department – the DCMS [Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport] – with it since. It is often described, not unreasonably, as a once in a generation opportunity to update our gambling framework and we look forward to the publication of a government white paper that will indicate next steps.”