Football’s betting sponsors must aid problem gamblers

PREMIER League football clubs are fuelling gambling addictions and should pressure their sponsors to fund addiction clinics, the head of the NHS has said.

Simon Stevens told a conference of NHS leaders in Manchester that he is “deeply concerned” by the lack of action to tackle addictive behaviour.

He urged football clubs to put pressure on their sponsors to fund treatment for gambling addiction – describing it as one of “the new threats” to health. All betting companies are asked to give 0.1 per cent of their revenues to charity voluntarily.

But none of the foreign companies who have shirt sponsorship deals with Premier League clubs have this year pledged any money to combat addiction, with just £11,000 paid the previous year, a register of donations shows.

Highlighting estimates that there are 430,000 problem gamblers in the UK, Mr Stevens said: “The voluntary target of funding from the gambling industry to support those services has not yet been responded to by eight of the foreign betting firms that sponsor Premier League clubs. We need to get on to the Premier League and ask it to ensure that those foreign gambling firms are playing their part.

“There is an increasing link between problem gambling and stress, depression and other mental health problems.

Taxpayers and the NHS should not be left to pick up the pieces. The NHS will now work with the Premier League on how we persuade these foreign

‘We need to [ask] the Premier League to ensure that foreign gambling firms are playing their part’

gambling companies to do the right thing,” he said. The Remote Gambling Association, which represents online gambling firms, said it wanted to see a statutory levy to ensure that funds are raised fairly and openly.

The Gambleaware charity said: “We are seriously concerned that the relationship between sport and gambling has reached a tipping point. There is a real risk advertising and sponsors are normalising gambling for children.”