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Strict standards or patriotic industry?

Posted in Advertising, Mel Varley, Latest reporters' blogs August 16th, 2007 by Melinda Varley

A new government crackdown on gambling adverts will see ‘foreign’ ads banned from the UK if they don’t meet the country’s strict standards. Is this another case of the gambling industry keeping out competition?

Last week we saw Camelot take the licence to run the National Lottery for the third consecutive time resulting in a demand from Richard Branson for a government inquiry into the decision.

He dismissed the win as a ‘farce’ and said National Lottery Commission should be “considering their positions” over the affair.

The new regulations laid in Parliament see new powers in the Gambling Act 2005 to ban gambling adverts from companies operating outside the European Economic Area (EEA).

The move means that some popular gaming websites will not be able to advertise in the UK from 1 September, coincidently knocking out the competition. What happened to the free market?

However, if you cast your mind back to last year, the US banned Americans from participating in gambling on websites outside the country and UK players participating on its websites – thus knocking out the EU competition.

Evidently, the gambling industry is huge in the UK and within the EU. Perhaps it’s a tribute to the nations love of sport and competition as well as out of boredom and need to only communicate online. 

However, are we so threatened by any changes to the gambling industry that we must continue to ride out competition from overseas operators? What does this mean for players that enjoy playing a hand of poker with international counterparts?