The anti-gambling lobby try again

As regular visitors to gambling.ie will know our primary purpose is to assist new online gambling enthusiasts with finding an appropriate sports gambling or casino gambling site, and to keep our readers up to date with what is happening in the world of online gambling, particularly if there is anything which may affect gambling in Ireland. With this in mind, we would not normally comment on proceedings in the British parliament but the last Prime Minister’s question time raised an issue which may have consequences for the whole of the gambling sector including online gambling. At present the anti- gambling lobby appears to be concentrated on the fixed odds machines which are now common place in our betting shops, with statements such as that it is possible for someone to lose over £20,000 in just one hour playing roulette on one of these machines. Whilst we cannot confirm or deny that statement, we find it hard to believe that any high roller with dreams of gambling that sort of money would decide to do it on a fixed odds machine in their local betting shop. We accept that for politicians it is common practice to exaggerate when trying to make a point, but it is another example of the use of inflammatory language to denigrate the concept of gambling in all its forms. Millions of people all over the world enjoy spots gambling and/or casino gambling as a leisure pursuit without any problems yet gambling continues to be a prime target for many of our politicians. Little wonder then that the banks feel justified in penalising anyone who they believe may be gambling. It seems strange to us that the anti-gambling lobby claims to be worried about the small minority of problem gamblers who may lose more than they can afford, yet say nothing about the unfair application of additional charges by the banks which may make the problem worse.