APPG Urges UK TV Stations to Stop Daytime Gambling Advertising

UK’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Gambling-Related Harm (APPG) has once again come forward with guns blazing to rally for safer gambling, this time calling out local TV stations that are promoting gambling material on their daytime advertising lineups. In its latest campaign for a safer gambling environment in the UK, The APPG has penned a letter to several TV channels urging them to end daytime gambling advertising.

Some of the TV channels under fire include the likes of Channel 5 and ITV to whom the letter was sent, demanding that the TV stations end the sponsorship arrangements with gambling companies without delay. Part of the letter that was sent to the TV channels reads;

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“Gambling companies are sponsoring programmes which seek to glamorise gambling with the aim of targeting women and young people and encouraging them to gamble. We are very concerned that television companies are promoting gambling, we have ourselves seen first-hand the harm and devastation that gambling can cause to young people’s lives, families and communities.”

For clarification purposes, in this letter, the APPG used prime-time TV show Neighbours as an example, a program that’s sponsored by Entain’s brand, Gala Bingo.

Alarm for Youngsters’ Exposure to Gambling Content on Daytime TV

In the letter, the APPG further emphasized that the main reason behind the letter was to protect youngsters from continuous exposure to gambling material via daytime ads on the popular TV channels. At a time when forced lockdowns still prevail across the United Kingdom, the All-Party Parliamentary Group drew attention to the fact that children are now stuck at home more than ever and as a result, there’s a higher risk of exposure to the gambling advertisements aired during the day.

The group went ahead and cited the findings of a previous survey carried out by YouGov about the rate of problem gambling in under-18s in the UK as follows; 

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"There are just under half a million problem gamblers in the UK, with many more people also suffering significant harm from gambling, in addition over 55,000 children between 11-16 year olds in England and Scotland are suffering from a gambling disorder."

As alarming as the quoted figures are however, it is worth noting that there has been a bit of controversy about the merits of the research in question, and the intention behind the figures. Either way, according APPG, 16 parliamentarians and 52 Experts by Experience  (individuals who have directly or indirectly been affected by gambling harm) public health experts, and other interest groups have called for  urgent action with immediate effect.

APPG’s Relentless Fight Against Gambling Harm in the UK Continues

So far in 2021, this is the second letter that the APPG alongside the mentioned interest groups has sent to gambling affiliated sectors with concerns for gambling harm. Last month, the same group wrote a letter to 11 of the most prominent football clubs in England and Scotland, raising concerns about the promotion of gambling content via their social media handles.

For the particular letter, some of the clubs who received the letter responded by indicating that they abide by industry-standard guidelines of social responsibility in any message that they post via their handles on Twitter and Facebook.

The APPG is the same group that breathed fire upon the UK Gambling Commission for not taking their job seriously enough to keep the industry safe. The group was formed by 50 cross-party members of the UK parliament to push for reforms and tighter industry regulation in a bid to fight against gambling harm. MP Carolyn Harris is the chairperson of the APPG and is one of the most vocal anti-gambling parliamentarians in the UK.