SNP MP Ronnie Cowan is to speak at a major rally on gambling reform in London next Tuesday.
The Inverclyde MP is expected to be joined at the event by former footballers Paul Merson and Peter Shilton. The rally has been organised by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Gambling-Related Harm, of which the MP is vice-chair.
He wants to see new curbs placed on the gambling industry over shirt advertising and advertising at football grounds, to protect children and young people from gambling.
READ MORE: Campaigners to walk from Glasgow to Edinburgh over football gambling adverts
The MP previously led a successful campaign to limit stakes at fixed-odds betting terminals in bookmakers’ shops, which had been identified as a major cause of gambling addiction in often disadvantaged communities.
The MP said: “Gambling does harm every single day, and football advertising plays a part in grooming children and normalising gambling in adults. Today’s equivalent of the tobacco industry are the gambling firms. They take in vast amounts of money, generate massive profits, and pay their elite employees huge salaries, while ruthlessly pursuing punters and squeezing every penny from them.
“The health and welfare of their customers is not a priority. Games are designed to be addictive. The exponential rate of growth of online casinos has removed the human touch, and punters have been reduced to being part of the machine.
“Gambling online can be 24/7. Cooling-off periods no longer exist. To feed addiction people have turned to crime, families have been broken, and people have committed suicide.
“The gambling industry funds research into addiction and support for those suffering, and they pick up the tab for the Gambling Commission, which regulates the industry.
“But it is not right that those causing the harm have the financial control over the research, education, treatment and regulation.
“The link between industry money and services for those suffering must be broken and the funding in the form of a statutory levy must be channelled through the NHS.”
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