Families of bereaved people staged a protest in parliament yesterday demanding official investigation into gambling-related suicides.
Campaigners claim that the Gambling Commission only investigated three gambling-related suicide cases in recent years. This is a tiny fraction of 400 addicted people who kill themselves each year.
Gambling with Lives claims that firms could get away with violating the law in most tragic cases by failing to discover what actually happened, which is a violation of the rights of bereaved families.
Public Health England estimates that over 2,000 gamblers have killed themselves since 2016.
Outside Parliament, members from 18 families who lost loved ones gathered to call for regulators to investigate future deaths due gambling.
Yesterday, the gambling minister said the Government had a ‘moral duty to do a lot more’ because it was ‘clear to me there is a serious problem with the number of people who have gambling addictions’.
Chris Philp, the under-secretary to the Parliament in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, intervened and raised hope that the Government would rein in gambling giants. With its Stop the Gambling Predators campaign, the Daily Mail calls for more protection of addicts.
Ministers are expected to announce proposals to reform the Gambling Act early next year in the biggest shake-up of the industry’s laws for 16 years. Bookmakers may be forced to ask for customers’ payslips to prove they can afford their gambling.
Tragic engineer, 25, bet £119k in 5 days
Daily Mail Reporter
The mother of high-flying engineer Chris Bruney, who took his own life hours after a gambling company gave him a £400 cash bonus to bet with, wants all gambling suicides to be fully investigated.
Mr Bruney, 25, pictured, gambled £119,000 in five days, but instead of shutting his account, Playtech plied him with bonuses and free bets.
He was one of three suicides that the Gambling Commission will examine in its investigation into his death, April 2017. The regulator found that Playtech broke the law and fined it £3.5 million.
Mr Bruney’s mother Judith said yesterday: ‘We feel the pain of Chris’s death every day.
‘Four years later the Gambling Commission still don’t record gambling suicides, yet alone investigate them. That needs to change.’
Chris Bruney
Companies will be required to share information to stop problem gamblers from losing too much with multiple casino sites.
There are more demands to reduce gambling-related deaths. The 18 grieving families of the deceased gathered in front of Parliament to call for regulators to investigate any future gambling deaths.
Charles Ritchie and Liz Ritchie lost Jack (24-year-old), after being bombarded by emails and offers via his cell phone, which drove him back to the gambling world.
Mrs Ritchie said: ‘We have ended up in a world where gambling is normalised by wall-to-wall advertising and sponsorship and those who have become addicted are seen as problem people who can’t gamble safely.
‘Gambling products are highly addictive and the predatory practises of gambling companies have gone unchecked for too long. This must stop immediately. We’re asking that the Gambling Commission investigates every gambling-related suicide for lessons to inform regulation and to establish if companies have broken the law.’
Addressing the families yesterday, Mr Philp promised reform, saying he had heard too many stories of bookmakers allowing customers to ‘lose obviously unaffordable sums of money’. He also expressed his anger that at-risk players have been ‘led to a very dark place with direct offers, marketing, and VIP treatment’.
He said: ‘Gambling addiction is a clinical addiction as serious as drugs, and it is definitely a public health issue. It is our moral obligation to help those who are suffering from gambling addiction. The gambling review will aim to do that.’
Labour MP Carolyn Harris, the chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for gambling harm, said: ‘It is good to see Chris Philp set out his desire for meaningful gambling reform today. There is still a long way to go, but we welcome his commitment to a public health approach preventing gambling related harm.’