London-based bookmaker William Hill recently launched a new problem gambling campaign, “Nobody Harmed,” in response to the U.K. Gambling Commission’s repeated calls for more industry action on problem gambling, particularly in regard to television advertising.
The company appointed Lyndsay Wright, manager of strategy and investor relations, as its first director of sustainability. She stated, “It’s actually something we’ve been working on for about nine months. We’re very conscious the company and the industry have seen a meaningful decline over a period of years in how people perceive gambling. We needed to ask ourselves some very tough questions about why that is the case, to understand the issue better and how we needed to respond to it. We’ve come out with this ambition that nobody is harmed by gambling, and it’s something we want to put down as what we stand for.”
Wright said William Hill’s focus would be in four areas: how products are designed and marketed; how to identify those at risk; how to support people with gambling addiction; and how staff members can address the issue of problem gambling. “Whether it is account-based play or a version thereof, we need to find better ways in terms of getting good data in retail for the customer’s sake. We’ll also challenge ourselves over the question of advertising. It’s something that has obviously raised a lot of questions, particularly around the World Cup,” Wright said.
“So this is a much broader issue, and us getting it right is critical to the long-term success of William Hill,” Wright said. “We’re an 84-year-old business and if we want to be here for the next 84 years we have got to do this the right way. We feel we’ve fallen short of what is expected of us. That is clearly affecting the reputation of the industry and of William Hill, and in all of that our customers need to be kept away from harm.”
According to Gambling Commission research, 430,000 people in the U.K. are problem gamblers, and another 2 million at risk. Additionally, for every problem gambler another six people are affected.
