UK racing sector launches petition against financial risk checks

The petition already has 40,000 signatures.

UK.- Nevin Truesdale, chief executive of the UK’s biggest racecourse operator, The Jockey Club, has started a petition against the Gambling Commission’s proposal for financial risk checks for online gambling. The petition already has 40,000 signatures. If it reaches more than 100,000, it must get a parliamentary debate.

The Gambling Commission proposes ‘unobtrusive’ financial risk checks for online gamblers who lose £125 in a month or £500 in a year but more thorough checks on those who lose £1,000 in a day or £2,000 over three months. It says it expects these more detailed checks to affect just 3 per cent of customers, although it has suggested that the threshold could be higher for those aged under 24.

However, the racing sector is concerned that the move could cause betting revenue to fall by up to £250m, causing an impact on equine welfare.

The petition reads: “We want the government to abandon the planned implementation of affordability checks for some people who want to place a bet. We believe such checks – which could include assessing whether people are ‘at risk of harm’ based on their postcode or job title – are inappropriate and discriminatory.”

Controversy over financial risk checks for online gambling

Financial risk checks, or affordability checks, are one of the most controversial proposals of the UK government’s gambling white paper. Last week, the Conservative MP Laura Farris added her voice to concerns about the potential impact on equine welfare and veterinary science since the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) has estimated that their introduction checks could reduce funding by 11 per cent.

The Labour Party peer David Lipsey, who is chairman of Premier Greyhound Racing, has also criticised the proposed financial risk checks for online gambling. He fears they could have a detrimental effect on the greyhound sector because they could cause high-spending customers to “disappear”.

There has been heated debate between the Gambling Commission on one side and the gambling and horse racing sector on the other. The Gambling Commission has accused critics of the proposals of spreading “misinformation”. The regulator’s CEO Andrew Rhodes has described the work on financial risk checks as the “most challenging part of what we’re doing”. A consultation on the issue closed last week.

On the other side, the responsible gambling charity GamCare says it believes the Gambling Commission’s proposed thresholds for financial risk checks for online gambling are too high. It has welcomed proposals to introduce the checks, but says that the proposed threshold of a £1,000 loss in 24 hours is “too significant an amount”.

It noted that with still no single-customer view of all of a player’s accounts, there would also be nothing to stop a player from incurring such a loss at multiple operators on the same day.