Sian Griffiths has called on the new Labour government to “course-correct the situation and deliver regulation that is fit for today’s world”.

UK.- Professor Sian Griffiths, GambleAware’s new chair of trustees, has urged the new Labour government to develop a “comprehensive national strategy” on gambling harm. She said the General Election betting scandal involving Conservative politicians was a “stark reminder of how normalised gambling has become in our society”.

Writing in PoliticsHome, the former faculty president of Public Health England (PHE), said: “In Britain, up to 4.8 million people experience harm from their own or someone else’s gambling.”

She called on the government to update the Gambling Act of 2005, which was introduced during a previous Labour government, arguing that the liberalisation of gambling that it allowed had led to catastrophic impacts. She raised particular concern about problem gambling impacts on women, marginalised communities, ethnic minorities and young adults.

She noted that one in seven 18 to 24-year-olds is estimated to be affected and that people in deprived and ethnic minority communities are twice as likely to experience harm.

“The incoming Labour government now has the opportunity to course-correct the situation and deliver regulation that is fit for today’s world,” Griffiths said.