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2026 has well and truly kicked off, and if anybody thought that UK gambling was out of the firing line, think again. After a turbulent and damning 2025, as the clock struck midnight to usher in the new year, more in common, a think tank and public policy research company published a report titled, Ending a Losing Streak. Taking the pulse of the UK public's perception of the gambling sector, the report revealed deep issues for the sector to tackle. But as always, things might not be so simple, and so we've brought together an expert duo to add little bit of nuance. Welcome back to iGaming Daily. This episode is brought to you by Optimove, the creator of positionless marketing and the number one player engagement solution for iGaming and sports betting operators. Are you heading to ICE? Well, if so, make sure to stop by Optimove stand in hall four. I'm Charlie Horner and today I'm joined by SBC News editor Ted Onplay and SBC Media's editor-at-large Ted Menmure. Ted and Ted, happy new year. I think we should get that one out of the way first. What a better way to kick off the year than talking about another report kicking UK gambling. Ted Menmure, how are you doing? Very well and glad to be back in the pod sphere. And yeah, it's 2026 going to. Ted, Ted OC that is. How are you doing? Did you think this was going to be the first story we'd be covering this year? em Well, to answer the first question, I'm doing okay. Yeah, feeling quite refreshed after a couple of days away for the festive period. And yeah, ready to get back into it in the studio, at ICE, everywhere. You know, the grind never stops for us, of course. Right, and to answer your question. Probably not. I don't think I expected em some research like this so early into the new year. Although of course, there is research and studies and surveys aplenty in this industry from, whether it's reform advocacy groups like this or from the industry itself, from the commission, from charities, from universities. We're no strangers to this sort of stuff, are we? We're not. We're not. But it was quite interesting to see that they published this on New Year's Day. us all a bit of work to do on the first day back, that's for sure. So thanks more in common. Ted M, how about you kick us off on this? What is the report? Who put it together? And I guess more importantly, who funded it? Okay. So this is a report and it's been put together by a think tank called more in common and more in common is it's research kind of focuses on public insights, public polling. And it's really kind of trying to find the blind spots between the public sensitivities and how policies are made. And one thing that it wants to put over is that it says that it wants to reflect kind of public sensitivities towards kind of policymaking in gambling and what should be acknowledged by ministers and the policy makers. around kind of sensitivity to gambling and its day-to-day coverage and presence in UK society. The project itself or the paper itself is funded by the Coalition to Stop Gambling Adverts. That is the new campaign by long-term reformist Ulprashaka. And it carries kind of a forward by Ian Duncan Smith calling for ministers to kind of really support or what's come to light is that the public's attitude has completely changed on how gambling should be governed and it views kind of gambling advertising or restrictions to be placed on gambling advertising in the UK and sponsorships as the first step in an easy win for politics in the UK to reform gambling. those points are really important to keep in mind when we talk about this, the funding and the forward. Although it does say that More In Common had full editorial control, em but it's definitely worth keeping in mind. that being said, Ted OC, and Ted M referred to it, what stance does it take towards gambling? It is more on the reformist side of the argument, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. It's more, yeah, obviously quite a critical report. It takes, as I said, a particular aim at the advertising side of it and an element of consumer trust as well, which is, as we said on previous podcasts, is a very important factor for companies to consider, particularly at a time of regulatory uncertainty and high taxes coming in. I think my main conclusion from this really is that this really hammers home how advertising is still going to remain one of the biggest points of contention. uh for this industry moving forward in 2026 and probably beyond. A lot uh of people who wanted to see gambling reform, legislative reform, regulatory reform and so on were not satisfied with what the gambling act review, what conclusions the gambling act review came to on advertising. Obviously during that whole process, that whole review over the two and a half years, I think that it was going on, there were a lot of calls for a ban on full the sport sponsorships across various levels of sport. em That obviously didn't happen. We've got the Premier League's front of ship voluntary band coming in, but a lot of reform advocacy groups and individuals want to see that go further. And I think the fact that this has been one of the main focuses of this report and of a lot uh of discussion around regulation shows that yeah, that it's going to continue to be a contentious issue. I'll just provide a bit. more background on this report. um More In Common are very well known for their polling and research and public policy, as Ted M said at the start. This was a piece of research done by surveying members of the British public um from Brent, Wigan, Clacton and Newmarket. Something that's really interesting is the way that More In Common segments people by their not just their political leanings in terms of the parties that they support, but some of their beliefs and where they fit into the wider political spectrum. So I think that's quite interesting and some of the conclusions that you can take from that, considering those factors are quite interesting. I would recommend taking a little bit of a read of that. em But Ted M, who does this report talk to? And is this where the cracks start to appear when you take a look at who they're talking to in the survey. Look, I think in terms of the basis for the report, it is important to kind of track how feelings and sensitivities and opinions are changing on any subject matter. And I think that is a good kind of basis to present insights from. Also, the fact is that I think this is the report is nuanced in certain terms with regards to, as you mentioned, segmentation in which it It already kind of goes with the basis that look, sentiments are changing and the segmentation of the sample pool of people that we are polling is divided into seven segments who already have kind of feelings towards gambling. What the report cites is that the British public are tolerant to gambling activities. but they're very sensitive or they're growing kind of insensitivity towards the encroachment of gambling and day-to-day life, especially with regards to advertising and that they don't think that they think that gambling has become overexposed and that they're not that the government's not dealing with harms. The other factor that comes into play is that there's a general distrust of authorities such as the gambling, the gambling commission and those attached to. the sector, and which is says that two thirds have kind of distrust towards those organizations working within gambling. Um, I think kind of the cracks appear in the terms of how kind of the questions have been put to the audiences and also how kind of the barriers of like the responses and how they were taken on board by the report itself. I just certainly said, I think there was a bit of kind of spoon feeding. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. it did seem like they were being pushed to say more negative responses towards the gambling industry. And one of the key themes that came out of it was the fact that there was a lot of anxiousness, anxiety about problem gambling and the prevalence of problem gambling in the UK, which are perfectly valid anxieties to have. perhaps maybe the scale of that was inflated. Ted OC, what are the recommendations and conclusions of the report and what does it kind of tell us about wider public opinion towards gambling? I think the, you know, speaking very broadly I think the report is calling for more visible and rapid reform. think they want, like I kind of mentioned earlier, I know this isn't specifically said but I think this just sort of summarises quite a broad feeling among the gambling reform advocacy uh community and spectrum, whatever you might want to call the groupings, that people feel that the gambling act review didn't go far enough and they want to see more radical and robust reform adopted quicker. There was quite an interesting element of it where the authors of the report say that gambling reform is a politically low risk, high reward opportunity. citing public opinion around that. I think that's something that's been noted in other countries as well, think, in the context of, yeah, regulatory reform debates in other European nations where people have taken note, politicians have taken note of the fact that the industry does often struggle with public perception and public opinion around it. It's quite an easy industry to build up negative narratives around. And therefore, yeah, it can be an easy way to score some political points, not to sound too cynical. But we've seen a lot of that, we've seen a lot of talking points like that in the conversation around taxation as well, as well, of course, like, you know, a lot of people on the street aren't going to feel too sympathetic when they hear about bookmakers and casinos getting charged higher tax rates, not in comparison to other businesses. So, em yeah, that's the, that's the main conclusion from the report. Really the one, the thing that should be quicker and more visible reform. And I think it's going to be beneficial to the government to do so. One of the only measures that I wanted to put through was that they should now treat gambling with the same measures as you treat kind of tobacco and alcohol and those kind of public displays. And then one kind of higher visibility of kind of controls for risk of behaviors. mean, that just, that's just part of the wider topic, isn't it? The wider discussion about gambling as a public health issue. We've been seeing that for years now. calls for it to be seen as that. I've been mounting a lot this year. We've seen our MPs and members of select committees and so on. Not this year, sorry, we're already in this year. Still adjusting, still getting used to the calendar. Over 2025, particularly in the sort of the back end of 2025, we did see a lot of discussions around that, the health and social care select committee and so on. Yeah, that's another thing. Building on my conclusion earlier about advertising. Yeah, this is just another reiteration of the public health debate and an argument will continue to be voiced very loudly in 2026. Brilliant. Well, Ted, Ted, we'll take a short break and then we'll have a little bit more of a deep dive into this. Welcome back to iGaming Daily. Today we're tackling perceptions of UK gambling. Feels like that was one of the main topics of 2025 and we're only a few days into 2026 and it's already the topic de jour. The tax judgements of 2025, Ted M, dominated the headlines last year, but it seems like it's only the beginning for reformers or the reformists who are looking to continue that kind of anti-gambling campaign. m It's going to take a lot for the gambling industry to fight back against, I guess. So where does the industry begin to draw its battle lines? Good question. And my feelings are that Again, you know, we're going from one judgment on taxes to another kind of unsettled, unsettled debate, which is advertising here. Now I've always kind of contended that advertising for the reformist is kind of viewed as, you know, the kind of victory ground in where kind of the debate and the decisions on the future kind of regulation of UK gambling goes towards because it's, it's the It's the matter that carries kind of the highest visibility. And it's the one where kind of, think, you know, the tanks are parked and you can kind of see throughout kind of the political spectrum that there's kind of clear kind of divisions on how this, this kind of juncture in the Yarmoune review should be, should be undertaken. uh In terms of it, I think that again, coming into kind of a new year, this is kind of, it's going to be again, a, you know, keep, I wouldn't call it necessarily a battleground, but it's just going to be kind of a point of disruption for the industry and where kind of the Labour government takes this, takes the debate to and whether it actually comes up with a final settlement on gambling advertising and sponsorships. Ted LC, before the break, you said that gambling was kind of a, an easy target for increased regulation and more taxes and m I tend to agree with you, it does seem like uh an easy one from a public point of view. One thing I noticed from this report and from just covering this topic for the last few years is that it seems like a lot of the public and a lot of policymakers don't actually understand the gambling industry, they don't understand regulations, they don't know the role of the gambling commission, they don't understand how this works, how it's regulated. what safer gambling materials are in place and what tools people can use. Do you think that rather than a regulatory problem, the industry just has an optics issue in that there are lots of things that the industry are doing, they're just not telling the public well enough. What do you make of that? It's a good question. think like lots of things to do with this industry, to do this topic together, obviously nuances to it. I think, yeah, something we've learned quite a lot over the past year, but throughout 2025, particularly during the year, as you said, the whole conversation around taxes and all the lobbying we saw around that, the industry probably does have a bit of a public relations issue in that sense, a bit of an image issue that needs to be addressed, both in terms of how it interacts with consumers or how it's viewed by consumers and how it interacts with policy makers and legislators. I mean, obviously, everyone out there has a basic premise of how the industry works is in that you place a bet, you expect to get money back from it. You go to the casino, you play your cards, you try and win, that sort of thing. But the intricacies of regulations, the intricacies of the ecosystem, how gambling interacts with various other quite important economic sectors and also cultural ones like sport across the UK. are probably not as well known or well explained. So yeah, you could maybe make the argument that perhaps the industry could benefit from doing some more public outreach, doing some more consumer outreach, trying to educate people about it, try and engage more with politicians in a positive way. But on the counter-argument to that, we could also say do people even want to understand? Like if someone's not got any interest... The consumer out there who's not got an interest in placing a bet, who's not got an interest in going to a casino as part of a night out, are they really that bothered about learning about the industry? I think that's going to be a problem that the industry is always going to have really. If people aren't interested in the product, they're not going to be interested in learning about it. They're not going to particularly engage about it. a negative opinion they might have about it won't be changed. And the same is said about lots of legislators. I think there's plenty of MPs out there who their mind is made up. They don't like the industry. They want to more regulation of it. They want to see more taxation of it. And it doesn't. And I don't mean to sound defeatist on that, but yeah, it doesn't really matter what level of political engagement you've got there in their camp. And we could also build on this a bit more and refer back to when in the aftermath of the budget, We had Dan from Regulus Partners on and he talks a lot about how maybe the industry needs to have a bit of a self-reflective period and think about, look back and go, what may have, what practices have we done or what mistakes we potentially made that have, that has led to some consumers having a negative opinion of us, that has led to people losing trust. And that has ultimately contributed to quite a politically, a difficult political environment in 2026. Yeah, definitely. really valid points and something that the industry does need to consider. But I guess one of the gripes that I sort of had when I was reading this report was the fact that it voices really quite strongly for change and for reform based on talking to members of the public who in some cases don't even gamble themselves or just don't interact with the products whatsoever. the message is we spoke to Joe Public in Wigan, Newmarket, Clacton, et cetera. And they say they don't think the gambling industry is regulated heavily enough, therefore we need to regulate it further. What do you think the gambling can do to sort of rebuild that trust with the public or do you think it's just a perennially broken relationship? Again, I just don't know where to kind of start with this. I mean, first of all, I do have to analyse, where is it broken? Is it broken with the consumer or is it just broken politically? And, you know, going back to what Ted was saying, like, yes, there's going to be going to self reflection, but what is the output of that? Because I'm not looking forward to kind of another PR campaign on trying to get into the good books of politics, you know, via the BGC. That didn't work. I think it's got to just start with basic steps. Number one, you need an ombudsman for UK gambling and you need a body where you can take Um, know, you can play. Your queries about gaming, you can find out who the licenses are. Also, it needs a tougher enforcement of who the good actors are and who are the bad licenses. There are, I still feel that UK gambling, you've got far too kind of many, too many kind of bad white label partners in there that need to be kind of, um, not necessarily taken out, but they need to be kind of put into place. does kind of higher taxes make that kind of more feasible for the sector? Possibly we don't know yet. ah There are kind of so many threads of this narrative about how we fix kind of public faith. And like, think that one of the kind of reactions you always see is this kind of instant, you know, reaction to go to, well, it's going to be PR. It's going to be about what we put out to the market and not necessarily reflective of actually what's happening. to gaming, to the licenses and how they want to kind of put themselves over to the consumer. ah That is where the change should happen. It should be a lot more organic. And as we bring this towards a close, Teto C, where do you think the operators should be looking to improve on this and where the industry should be going to put player protection towards the center of the strategy and do it without the labels of being a bit disingenuous and. perhaps a bit condescending. It's a difficult task, isn't it? Yeah. eh Yeah, I think there's your answer there. I don't know. We have these initiatives like Safer Gambling Week and so on. and that, think that things like that is obviously they have their purpose of showing what the industry does. But I think often a lot of consumers will look at that and politicians will look at that and they see that as an example of a token measure. think the industry, as much as those measures and initiatives are positive, you need to show how you're doing that all year round. You know what mean? And like, really put that as, as, as part of political engagement, consumer engagement. We're seeing a lot of it in marketing a lot more, but yeah, perhaps, perhaps another look at marketing and how these safer gambling messages are factored into marketing as well, because people are clearly have quite a lot of cynical views of that. And yes, see that as either like a token message or you just sort of, you're just doing it because you're under pressure because you have to, yeah, there needs to be a bit of creativity around that as well. But yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a tricky question. sorry, just to add to be, think one thing that the industry hasn't faced or needs to face is that you've got a government that now wants to be on the treat this on, you know, as a public health issue, but it's. So if you're going to treat that as like, yes, okay, tobacco and alcohol with those warnings, it's like where kind of does gambling fit in and where kind of do you see that the best warnings towards advising the audiences and warning the audiences of kind of public health consequences, where can kind of gaming fit in and create kind of those warnings and work with the authorities on that. Yeah, it feels like that's going to be one of the major themes of this year. is finding out where gambling fits in all of this and 2026, 2027 really are going to be the last two years where this government can actually do anything before it turns towards election gear. So we're going to find those answers out quite quickly, I would imagine, but the debates will rumble on over the next 12 months, that's for sure. But for now, Ted OC, Ted M, thanks very much for taking the time to do this one. I know it's a bit of a heavy one for- the first proper podcast of 2026. New Year everyone! But thanks to the audience for tuning into today's episode of iGaming Daily and join us again tomorrow to keep up to date with all the latest global gambling news.