The Commission’s keynote speech at the ‘Know How’ conference

The fourth annual ‘Know How’ conference took place across 7 and 8 September 2021.

In his keynote speech at the conference, Tim Miller, Executive Director at the Gambling Commission (the “Commission”), emphasised the Commission’s continued focus on the Licensing Objectives:

• preventing gambling from being a source of crime or disorder, being associated with crime or disorder or being used to support crime;
• ensuring that gambling is conducted in a fair and open way; and
• protecting children and other vulnerable people from being harmed or exploited by gambling.

He referred to the Commission’s activity over the last 18 months and the effect of the pandemic on the industry, acknowledging that COVID had clearly had a significant impact on the behaviours of consumers and their exposure to risk.

His speech focused on the Commission as an evidence-based regulator, covering;

• progress in relation to ad-tech, the treatment of VIPs and the design of games and products to make gambling fairer and safer;
• the approach to keeping crime out of gambling;
• operator’s interaction with customers at risk of harm; and
• raising the Commission’s standards.

In closing, he emphasised that there was one simple message to take away:

Whatever else changes, the work to make gambling in Great Britain fairer, safer and crime free continues.

Evidence Based Regulator

Tim Miller sought to emphasise that the Commission continued to seek to deliver the Licensing Objectives by gathering and acting based on evidence. Its approach was to identify risks based on evidence, address issues quickly and underpin progress with regulatory requirements. He recognised that though evidence may not always be conclusive, action would be taken through use of a precautionary principle.

Safer and fairer gambling

Tim Miller noted that prior to the pandemic the Commission had called upon the industry to make progress to make gambling fairer and safer in three areas:

• use of Ad-Tech to protect children, young people and vulnerable people;
• the treatment of high value customer or VIPs; and
• the design of games and products.

In relation to Ad-Tech, the actions taken immediately by the industry to protect children, young and vulnerable people included a common list of negative search terms and suppression websites, use of data to ensure paid for ads are targeted away from vulnerable groups, advertising targeted only at over-25s, age gating YouTube channels and content and a regularly updated and amended code of conduct to be implemented by affiliates.

He also reminded operators of the new rules intended to stop irresponsible VIP customer practices. Prior to making a customer a VIP, operators must now:

1. establish the customer’s spending is affordable and sustainable;
2. assess whether there is evidence of gambling related harm or heightened risk;
3. ensure licensees have up to date evidence on identity, occupation, and source of funds; and
4. continue to verify information.

Finally, he noted that the new online games rules aiming to make them safer will come into force on 31 October 2021 and will ban four key features of online slot games:

• features which speed up play or give the illusion of control over the outcome;
• slot spin speeds faster than 2.5 seconds;
• auto-play; and
• sounds or imagery which suggest a win when the return is equal to or less than the stake.

Keeping crime out of gambling

Tim Miller also sought to focus on the Commission’s steps to shut down illegal sites and take enforcement action against licensed operators.

He noted that the Commission had conducted a significant number of remote assessments and that compliance and enforcement action illustrates that operators were failing to meet money laundering standards. He noted that risk assessments and policies and procedures continue to be not fit for purpose and explained that this year’s Compliance and Enforcement Report would again cover notable cases and set out expectations on operators.

Customer Interaction

Current customer interaction requirements came into force in October 2019 and placed a duty on remote operators to identify customers at risk of harm and take action. However, Tim Miller warned that the Commission had seen clearly unaffordable levels of gambling take place with no interaction being taken until a late stage. He stated:

Just to be clear, we are not talking about grey areas here. We are talking about significant binge gambling or clearly unaffordable levels of gambling without action being taken. Can anyone in this room seriously justify allowing a new customer to lose £10,000 within minutes without any checks or interaction?

He advised that the Commission, after receiving a significant response to its call for evidence (around 13,000 responses), will publish revised LCCP (Licence Conditions and Codes of Practice) requirements on customer interaction in the coming weeks.

He also confirmed that the Commission’s planned next step was a consultation on thresholds for identifying key financial risks including significant losses in a short time, over a long time and financial vulnerability, but that it did not intend to consult on issues part of the Gambling Act review.

The Commission’s standards

Tim Miller went on to consider the Commission’s own standards and powers, emphasising that it must strive to be a high performing, efficient and effective organisation. He emphasised the Gambling Act review would be an opportunity to look at the Commission’s powers and resources to ensure strong performance and that it would work with government and fellow regulators to raise standards.

Tim Miller also recognised the National Audit Office’s criticism of the Commission’s use of data as a regulatory tool in February 2020 and that the Commission needed to do more and emphasised that it required robust comprehensive data from operators.

He noted that the regulatory returns process has historically required considerable quality assurance – due to late, lacking or errors in submissions – and that that could not continue. To address this, next year’s Business Plan will set out a programme of compliance and enforcement action around quality and timeliness of returns. He recommended that operators ensure their data quality processes are robust and fit for purpose – in order to support the Commission’s evidence-based approach.

Timeline of key developments