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Some of the largest UK banks are set to become part of the movement aimed at tackling problem gambling in 2019. Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland and Santander will block the use of their debit cards with local bookmakers by making changes to their existing banking applications. The banks have explained that the crackdown will provide their customers with better control over their expenses by allowing them to plan their spending. The decision of the aforementioned high street banks followed the measures taken by Barclays after the latter became the…

A 40-year-old female has been sentenced to five years in jail after stealing over £400,000 from her employers in a period of seven years in order to fuel her problem gambling. According to information provided by prosecutors, Kathleen Weir, a Southampton-based accountant, spent a total amount of £1.2 million to bet on sports online during a seven-year span, from 2009 to 2016. Previously, Ms Weir confessed two cases of defrauding the city’s Elliotts builders merchants. The Southampton Crown Court heard that the defendant, also known as Kathleen Griffin, began to…

The finance director Steven Girling who misappropriated a total amount of about £1 million from his employer to pay for his online gambling habit, as well as a luxury lifestyle, has received a four-year jail sentence. As reported by Casino Guardian at the beginning of December, the 36-year-old Steven Girling in fact admitted stealing the money from Premier Education Group in the period from 2014 to 2017 and was jailed by a judge at Norwich Crown Court. As the man himself revealed at the court hearing, he spent approximately £50,000…

The trend of English football teams inking sponsorship agreements with local and international gambling operators is still ongoing. For the time being, nine out of the twenty clubs in the English Premier League, as well as 17 out of the twenty-four football clubs in the Championship, have a betting company for a main shirt sponsor – something they have been widely criticised for lately. Sponsorship agreements between professional football clubs and gambling operators have become a massive business which spends more than £260 million on an annual basis on securing…

The upcoming year is set to bring significant changes to the current gambling laws in Ireland as the government is in the process of updating the regulatory framework that has been described as terribly outdated. A new, draft legislation is expected to be published in the coming months but could this long-awaited reform be finally enacted in 2019? The new legal framework would regulate the multi-billion gambling and betting industries in Ireland, home to some of the largest betting companies in the world. The Irish Government is now trying to…

It must have been an unpleasant surprise for a local Salford casino to find out that around £60,000 has been stolen from the gambling establishment on Christmas Day. In a brazen burglary, an unidentified number of individuals have gained access to the casino by smashing the wall at the back of the building. The thieves have taken gambling chips worth approximately £60,000 from Genting Casino in Salford, a relatively small casino on Cromwell Road, the Manchester Evening News reported on Wednesday. Nothing else has been stolen from the establishment, the…

The last few years have been a long and turbulent period for the UK gambling industry, as far as fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) are concerned. The saga has had its ups and downs, with some unexpected turns, fierce verbal battles between FOBT proponents and opponents, and even a ministerial resignation filed in the process. In November 2018, the UK Government finally announced a U-turn over the previously revealed delay to the FOBT crackdown, saying that the long-expected change in the machine’s maximum stakes would be brought forward as initially expected,…

The long-awaited crackdown on illegal gambling operations in Ireland has been one of the most-discussed topics in the local gaming industry in 2018. With much more said than done, local authorities have decided to expand the clampdown on unlawful casinos in Dublin, at a time when a gambling control bill has hardly seen any progress for more than five years now. As Casino Guardian reported in October, the Revenue Commissioners revealed that it made a decision to expand its clampdown on Dublin-based illegal casinos. The process of the notorious gambling…

A number of betting shops in Birmingham are expected to see a tighter regulatory regime, as council licensing chiefs have decided to impose a further crackdown on them. Birmingham City Council has made a proposal for some alterations in its gambling policy to be made, with a requirement for risk assessment to be made locally when it comes to the applications for new bookmakers also included. The middle of the week saw the Licensing and Public Protection Committee being told that such a step would provide officers with more powers…

In its final report, the Independent Review of Integrity in Tennis has recommended a ban on betting sponsorship in the sport. At the beginning of 2016, the governing bodies in tennis appointed a special panel to review the connection between tennis and sports betting following some concerns released in the media. Now, the panel led by the barrister Adam Lewis QC has finally published its opinion. As mentioned above, the recommendations include a ban on sponsorship agreements between sports betting operators in tennis, a restructuring of the Tennis Integrity Unit,…