UKGC Reports of Minors Playing Pub Gaming Machines

United Kingdom Gambling Commission has conducted a series of tests on a sample of pubs in England that led them to a conclusion that 89% of pubs regularly fail to prevent underage visitors from playing gaming machines!

A Cause For Extreme Concern

For the sake of comparison, this failure rate is severe when put in comparison with the average failure rate for age restrictions in alcohol and tobacco industries – 15% and 30% respectively.

As soon as the results were in, the UKGC wrote an urgent open letter to the pub industry in which they call to a swift and most urgent action for new measures to be instated.

Key parts of the letter read as follows:

“In June 2018 the Gambling Commission (the Commission) set out further commitments to protecting children and young people from the dangers of gambling, building on work already underway in this area.

[…] The Commission called for all those responsible for safeguarding children, to work together with the Commission to address the wide range of issues identified in RGSB’s advice. Amongst the actions identified was the need to address access and exposure to gambling by children and young people.

[...]The interim results are sufficiently concerning that we consider it to be in the public interest to release them immediately. The current failure rate is 89% based on 61 tests. This compares to a pass rate of 70 – 85% for most age restricted products such as alcohol or tobacco. (Source: Serve Legal.)”

Matters Must Be Improved

The letter, signed by UKGC's Executive Director of Enforcement, Richard Watson, concludes with the urgent call to the industry and their Trade Associations to “take the results as serious indication of the need to improve matters.”

He also added that the Commission will support licensing authorities and their actions against operators who fail to meet the requirements and on whose premises underage groups continue to gamble.

Under British laws, minors are not allowed to play Category C gaming machines in pubs which should display visible signs indicating the age restriction. If signs fail, pub staff must stop the culprits from playing.

Programme Director at the Gambling Commission, Helen Rhodes, said at the Institute of Licensing National Conference that the entire commission is extremely concerned that pubs all across the country repeatedly make the same mistake and permit children to play games meant for adults.

“We expect to see significant improvement in further tests and will continue to work with licensing authorities to support any action required against those failing to adhere to the requirements.”

Busy Regulative Year

The UK's regulatory body has been quite active this year with taking preventive measures against operators and casinos caught red-handed...

...Just last week, the Commission called on the entire industry for a more unified approach in order to get to know their customers better and make the Great Britain “the safest and fairest place in the world for gambling.”

They were also forced to enforce financial penalties on companies and operators who were found guilty of breaching anti-money laundering acts and failing to protect vulnerable players – this included even such household brands like 32Red and PaddyPower.

Source:

“Gambling Commission highlights failure to stop children playing on 18+ pub gaming machines”, gamblingcommission.gov.uk, November 15, 2018