Children twice as likely as adults to have a betting problem

Children twice as likely as adults to have a betting problem
By Daniel Martin, Whitehall Correspondent


Children are twice as likely to be problem gamblers as adults, a survey has revealed.
The charity Gamcare estimates that around 60,000 children aged between 12 and 15 are addicted to gambling, the equivalent of one in 50.

Among the over-16s, there are an estimated 450,000 people with a gambling addiction, a proportion of less than one in 100.

The figures suggest that gambling could become an even bigger issue in the future, as the problem teenagers progress into adulthood.

Many children get hooked on gambling by spending their pocket money on fruit machines in service stations and amusement arcades.

Playground bets on football results or marbles could also be responsible for igniting an interest among vulnerable children.

Lax checks on age in high street betting shops and online sites fuel the problem by allowing young teenagers to place bets with ease.

A spokesman for Gamcare said: ‘The clinical evidence suggests that among adults some 0.9 per cent are problem gamblers, while among children aged between 12 and 15 the proportion is around 2 per cent.

‘If gamblers start young there is a risk that this could continue into adult life.’

The evidence on teenage addiction comes from a submission by Gamcare to MPs investigating gambling.

The charity said: ‘Many problem gamblers have experienced some form of trauma, abuse or loss in their past, leaving them with a deficiency in expressing and containing their feelings.
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‘By the time they seek help this group has usually been gambling for many years, starting from an early age; they may have had a significant figure in their life who gambled (parent, grandparent, uncle) or conversely have had a parent whose injunctions were all about saving money and being risk averse.’

Children under 18 are banned from gambling, although they may enter the National Lottery at 16.

Starting young: If gamblers start young they are at risk of continuing in adult life
Helena Chambers, director of Quaker Action on Alcohol and Drugs, put the blame on fruit machines designed for use by children.

They offer small rewards but are designed so similarly to those for adults that many simply move on as they grow older.

Speaking to MPs on the Commons culture select committee in November, she said: ‘We have concerns about all children’s gambling, but the evidence is strongest about fruit machine gambling and there are studies that show the higher rates among adolescents, the higher rates of problems you get among adults.’

Professor Jim Orford, a gambling specialist at Birmingham University, told MPs: ‘I believe we are about the only jurisdiction that seriously regulates gambling that allows children to play on things that look just like adult machines and, therefore, could be said to be encouraging them to learn how to do that.

‘There is an awful lot of evidence, not just about gambling, that if you start on things early in life that are potentially dangerous, then you are more at risk of coming into problems with those when you are adult. Certainly, in the alcohol field there is a mass of evidence that suggests that.’

Tory MP Louise Mensch, a member of the culture select committee, said she had been shocked at some of the personal testimonies on the forum of the GRASP (Gambling Reform and Society Perception) organisation.

She said: ‘Clearly, one thing that comes up again and again is people saying that they got into gambling through fruit machines.

‘There are many, many stories of young people saying that fruit machines were their first addictive leap into gambling.’