Irish Times view on the gambling boom: cashing in on addiction

There are always more losers than winners in gambling. Whenever punters place a bet, all the other horses run for the bookmaker. But the panoply of risk as gambling booms online is more pernicious than ever.

Technology in the 21st century is perfectly placed to exploit the vulnerabilities of gamblers who cannot resist the urge. Smart-phone apps drive them toward the next punt, at any hour of the day or night. Saturation advertising eggs them on, and the “gamblification” of sport and digital games makes a wager of everything. An alignment with football culture appeals to young men particularly, and cross-selling sucks them from sports betting into online casinos. This is the way it is now, and there is no avoiding the misery and desperation it can cause.

In 2013 the American Psychiatric Association recognised gambling addiction as a disorder like alcohol and drug addiction, the first non-substance related condition categorised in that way. Last year the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland said gambling disorder should be considered a “major public health concern”, noting that prevalence was likely to increase with online gambling.

Campaigners say pandemic lockdowns and the cancellation of sport fixtures only intensified the problem, drawing people into online casino and poker games that have been likened to crack-cocaine because they are so addictive.

Disordered gamblers suffer difficulties with anger, aggression, mood, relationships, work, money and mental health. Surveys point to people borrowing cash or selling items to fund gambling, and financial consequences for families. Problem gamblers are also at increased risk of suicide. Maynooth University academics have identified co-dependencies on alcohol and drugs among young Irish people engaged in harmful gambling. In a January report they cited data that suggests there are “approximately 40,000 problem gamblers” in Ireland.

All of which underscores the State’s glaring failure to modernise the oversight of a sector whose relentless online expansion has exposed the fragmented and limited nature of such regulation as there is. The need for a complete overhaul was recognised as far back as 2013 but it was only in October that the Government published outline laws to establish a new independent regulator in 2023, after a decade of talk.

The new regulator will have the ability to impose fines for licensing breaches, advertising and sponsorship codes and safeguards against problem gambling. Whether it will have sufficient powers is the big question. The new regime will be as strong only as the law underpinning it. That will be the measure of the Government’s willingness to assert control over a sector whose deleterious impact on the health of addicts rightly draws comparisons with tobacco.