BETTER CHANGE
Enabling Play
Better Change’s engagement director, Rob Mabbett, asks “Why shouldn’t an advocate for safer gambling enjoy gambling?”
I
like gambling, not just one form of gambling either I like lots of different types from casino games such as Blackjack and Roulette to sports betting, football, horses, cricket, snooker you name it I am on it! To top it off I like, in fact I really like slot games. Online or offl ine, with friends as part of an event or on my own as a pastime, I like gambling.
I’m not making it up, the statement above is true, but I want to ask you honestly, does that statement sit right with you? Especially when its coming from someone who works predominantly in the prevention of gambling harm. If the answer is no, then I want you to think about why. Why shouldn’t an advocate for safer gambling enjoy gambling? Why does it feel a bit wrong to hear someone in safer gambling talk about gambling in a positive light? A lot of this is down to stigma and a negative narrative that we have allowed to permeate through our industry and indeed into the public perception of our industry. It is not new of course; certain types of gambling have always carried with them a certain air of mischief or even menace, but
16 MAY 2025
others have been painted in a much more glamorous light. I’m thinking of 1960’s Sean Connery as James Bond, cigarette in mouth playing a high stakes game of cards with a villain in a Mayfair casino. There are events where for one day only it’s the social norm to gamble. Think of the Grand National which was recently staged in the UK - one of the world’s most famous horse races - or there are times when you are not really gambling, you are supporting good causes by playing a national, state or charity lottery. We all have our lucky numbers and have had the “what if” conversation! But for many, if you asked them about gambling, they would either disapprove or have a view that it was something that was a bit ‘naughty’. So, who will champion this industry? Who can change this negative perception? Well, nobody outside of it that is for sure! It’s on us. Governments will gratefully accept your tax contributions, but regulations are tightened far more often than they are relaxed. At the end of the day, only those who work in the industry - who serve customers and are advocates for healthy, positive play - will enable play.
But what about people who have been harmed or are experiencing harm? This is obviously really important, and we should do everything in our power to get those experiencing harm the support they need but where far too often the identifi cation and reaction to harm is the starting point of a safer gambling strategy; we need to re-think it in a way that it is at the end. For many of us this will represent less than 1% of our customers. What about the other 99%?
Enabling play is what we do, we work in gambling, we facilitate gambling and gambling is our product. Nobody else whether it be government, regulators, trade bodies, support services or the press will engage with the public in the same way that gambling operators do. We have to educate our players and empower them and allow them to make choices about how they consume our products. This starts with getting good people into our businesses, training them, building gambling literacy - so that they understand our products and our customers’ needs - and enabling our customers to play in a positive way as opposed to restricting play as
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