At the heart of the Westminster Media Forum, Ian Angus, a member of the Gambling Commission, took to the stage, presenting a report titled “Regulation, Reform, and the Future of the Gambling Industry“.
Angus underscored that in Britain, gaming is primarily safe, fair, and crime-free. This has been the decade-long commitment of the Gambling Commission, which has long advocated that gaming should primarily be a form of entertainment. Through Angus’s words, the results of a long and meticulous effort were revealed.
Up until March 2022, gaming in the UK amounted to £14.1 billion. From March to December of the same year, about 44% of British adults participated in a gaming activity. These figures still largely reflect the shocks of the pandemic, but the data are similar to those at the start of 2020. Angus highlighted how physical gaming continued its recovery, returning to a 28% participation rate and once again surpassing online, which remained at 27%.
In England, the online gambling is not yet as entrenched as elsewhere, unlike in Italy another European reference market. However, the percentages speak of a mature and growing market, particularly from a competitiveness standpoint“, says Giada Benazzi of Gaming Report, a specialised site on the online casino sector in Italy.
“The strength of British gaming lies precisely in the operators, towards whom the Gambling Commission’s action is always projected: improving the operators means improving the sector, a philosophy similar to the one that exists between ADM and Italian online casinos”, continues Benazzi from Gaming Report. In this sense, the changes of recent years have been structural: a code of conduct for the entire sector, a series of eliminations in the online world – such as automatic gaming, a drastic reduction in VIP programs, reduction of pathological gaming damages through the single customer view, an efficient user protection solution. The watchword is collaboration between the Gambling Commission and all parties involved in the different contexts of the United Kingdom.
But in the meantime, the White Paper for the revision of the Gambling Act is awaited. In some cases, the Commission – Angus points out – has already acted, by introducing stringent measures to make online gaming safer, with new rules on customer interaction and an efficient assistance service. The work of the Gambling Commission does not underestimate the centrality of the person, which remains the priority, coupled with regulation that works for everyone, operators, and users.
Finally, an eye on gaming problems: the British Commission is always vigilant and attentive in monitoring and preventing gaming risks. Even experimenting with new methodologies, for which data are available: problematic gambling in the UK is stable at 0.2%. This is also one of the priorities for British gaming authorities. To protect twenty-two million people, the most important number to consider and deal with.