We regularly write articles for industry and legal journals & magazines, including commentaries for Online Gambling Lawyer & iGaming Business, a monthly “Licensing Expert” piece for SBC News and a fortnightly page for Pub & Bar and, with their permission, are reproducing them on our website, together with our own news items and reports on topical issues affecting the leisure and gambling industries.

BGC calls for bold steps in tomorrow’s Budget statement

Ahead of tomorrow’s Budget statement by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Betting and Gaming Council has urged him to take bold steps to help retail leisure industry, including bookies and casinos, and to tackle the online black-market. Key aspects of the BGC’s Budget submission are as follows: Reform of business rates, including changing the rules […]

“Rules Britannia” – analysing Britain’s regulatory burden

Coincidentally following on shortly after publication by the National Audit Office of its report entitled “Gambling regulation: problem gambling and protecting vulnerable people” (which contained a number of criticisms of the Gambling Commission in relation to its regulation of commercial gambling in Great Britain), the Institute of Economic Affairs (“IEA”) has published a report entitled “Rules […]

Third operating licence suspension (pending review) in 13 working days

The UK Gambling Commission has today announced the suspension of the third remote operating licence in the space of just thirteen working days. This time around, it has commenced a review of the combined remote casino, real event and virtual betting operating licence held by Stakers Limited and, arising from that review, has suspended its licence because […]

MUP – Two Down, One To Go

In his article for the March 2020 edition of Pub & Bar magazine entitled “MUP – Two Down, One To Go”, David Clifton focuses on MUP (i.e. minimum unit pricing for alcohol) developments in Scotland and Wales, and ponders its introduction in England. Publication of this article has: coincided with the formal introduction in Wales (on 2 March […]

Gambling Commission consults on amendments to display of licensed status requirements in the LCCP

The UK Gambling Commission is consulting until 20 May 2020 on proposals to amend its licence conditions and codes of practice (LCCP), that it says will: improve the consistency of its requirements for the display of licensed status on websites and expand licence condition 8.1 to non-commercial societies and local authority websites offering access to lottery tickets. […]

Some significant proposed LCCP changes are buried within new Gambling Commission consultation

The Gambling Commission is consulting until 20 May 2020 on changes to its regulatory data reporting requirements. It summarises the consultation on its website as follows: Our proposals seek to make data requirements more efficient for licensees, and for us, by only requesting data that supports our regulatory aims. These changes seek to: improve data quality […]

National Audit Office Report published – Gambling regulation: problem gambling & protecting vulnerable people

The National Audit Office has today published a report entitled “Gambling regulation: problem gambling and protecting vulnerable people” (that you can download below, together with a summary of the report and the National Audit Office’s press release). It examines the extent to which gambling regulation protects people from gambling‑related harms and addresses emerging risks. The report’s […]

GamCare dragged into the current UK gambling debate

On 23 February 2020, the Sunday Times published an article entitled “Gambling charity ‘censors’ addicts in chatrooms” in which it stated as follows in relation to GamCare: Britain’s leading gambling charity, which is funded by the industry, has censored addicts on its forums who lobby against the predatory behaviour of betting firms. The online forums […]