This month the UK’s Gambling Commission has revised its annual report and accounts covering the first full year of its activity since the Gambling Act 2005 came into force on 1 September 2007. The report includes a supplement containing updated figures on integrity in betting. Also the Commission has submitted a further report to the Minister for Sport on the impact of high-stake, high-prize, and other gaming machines - June 2009 with qualitative research studying the behaviour of machine gamblers.

Recommendations made by the Gambling Commission were considered by the Responsible Gambling Strategy Board who decides on longer term research priorities. Objectives of the report were to understand: player motivations for gaming machine play in the context of their gambling activity; structural characteristics of machines: for example the impact of stakes and prizes, impact of frequency and size of wins, and the availability of note acceptors on player behaviour; situational characteristics: for example the accessibility of machines to players and the availability of additional funds within a venue (e.g. ATMs); and player attitudes to smart cards and other technologies which track individual behaviour and allow spending limits to be set.

Interestingly, the research did not find that problem gambling was related to jackpot size. Whilst jackpot size was considered important, availability of funds tended to be a stronger driver of behaviour, with funds dictating the category of machine played. Therefore, problem gamblers were as likely to play category C machines as B1, B2, B3 or B3A,2 depending on how much money they had. Participants in the research considered social responsibility measures rather ineffectual given the prevalence of machines and the ease of access.

The updated figures on integrity in betting reveal that there were 71 cases of suspicious betting activity reported to the Commission between 30 September 2007 and 30 September 2009. Of these, 46 were reported by betting operators under licence condition 15.1 in the first instance with 25 coming from other sources, for example sports governing bodies, the media or the public. In 38 of these cases the grounds for suspicion of criminal activity have not been substantiated following an initial consideration. Of the remainder, 27 cases have been passed to the relevant sports governing body for investigation and there are also 6 active investigations in which the Commission is involved. (E-11.23.09)

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