The GamCare Annual Review published last month indicates that in 2009/10 more women gambled on the Internet, gaming machines and bingo than in the previous year. There was a 47% increase in callers to the UK charity’s NetLine, which is favoured by female and young gamblers. GamCare has specially trained advisors to offer callers worried about their gambling habits practical advice and emotional support. In 2009/10 19% were referred to specialist counselling and 12% referred to software that blocks gambling sites.

Fruit and slot machines are the most likely to cause problems for female gamblers – 36% of calls from women. The addictive FOBTs found in betting shops only accounted for 8% of their calls, due in part to bookies still remaining generally a male domain. Across gender the gambling pattern has changed little, most callers are male and gamble in betting shops. However, 17% of female clients in counselling were gambling in betting shops compared to 8% in 2008/09.

The prevalence of problem gambling amongst adolescents is three times higher than that amongst adults. 40% of clients aged 18-25 were gambling in the betting shop. The predominant gambling activities they gave were FOBTs (15%) and fruit/slot machines (14%), followed by betting on events (10%) and horses (9%). No clients under 18 said they gambled on the Internet and just 13% of clients aged 18-25.

GamCare CEO Andy McLellan says: “This is a serious wake-up call that we need to take seriously the wider accessibility of gambling and the real importance of education and wider awareness of responsible gambling, particularly for women and young people. We want anyone who needs our help to know that they can call us in complete confidence, on the phone or online, and that we are there to help, not to judge.”

He added, We also want to do much more, targeted prevention work – very little is going on at present but as soon as the funds can be made available we are ready with our partners to launch new initiatives. We also need to look carefully at online gambling. In many ways, operators have more opportunities online to help the player, for example by putting in place checks and controls which anyone can set themselves. Anyone gambling online should look for the GamCare Certification logo, which shows that the operator – wherever they are operating from – has satisfied us that they have a reliable approach to player protection.”

GamCare, a registered charity, was established in 1997 and is the leading national provider of counselling, advice and practical help for anyone experiencing or affected by problem gambling. In 2009/10 it answered over 35,000 calls and saw an 89% rise in new users of its online Forum. Over 52% of female callers to the helpline were calling about someone else’s gambling. 30% of callers in the 18-25 year olds owed between £6,000 and £10,000.

Last year GamCare distributed 90,000 leaflets and 17,000 posters, which appears to have had some success in advertising the service. 23% of callers found out about GamCare from the leaflets and stickers displayed by the gambling industry. In 2009/10 Gamcare also delivered 32 training sessions in social responsibility to the gambling industry, 10 of them in other jurisdictions.

Most of GamCare funding is raised voluntarily by the gambling industry and channelled through the Responsible Gambling Fund. In 2009/10 the charity received £2.46million from the RGF and raised a further £250,000 themselves. In June this year, commenting on the six new bodies created to determine strategy and raising and distributing funding, GamCare said, “Sadly, though, rather than expanding our services this year, as we should be, our funding for 2010/11 has been frozen, making it difficult even to maintain existing services let alone develop new ones. Yet there is more money in the system than there has ever been before.” (E-08.09.10)

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