Government faces call for immediate 'light-touch' affordability checks following William Hill penalty

The government faced a call for an immediate introduction of "light-touch" affordability checks on Wednesday as peers debated gambling policy in the wake of the record punishment handed to William Hill this week.

On Tuesday, the Gambling Commission hit William Hill with a £19.2 million penalty for what the industry regulator described as "widespread and alarming" social responsibility and anti-money laundering failures.

The news came as the wait goes on for the government to publish its long-delayed plans for gambling reform following a review of the 2005 Gambling Act launched more than two years ago.

Its white paper is expected to contain proposals on the controversial subject of affordability checks on customers, which British racing believes are already costing the sport tens of millions of pounds in revenue.  

Lord Foster of Bath, the chair of Peers For Gambling Reform, told the House of Lords that the William Hill case "and other egregious breaches of current player protection arrangements show all too clearly these arrangements simply don't work".

He added: "Given . . . no new legislation is required shouldn't we be immediately introducing a single independently overseen system of light-touch affordability checks to which all gambling companies must adhere?"

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In response, government minister Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay did not directly address the issue of affordability checks. He did say the penalty given to William Hill showed the Gambling Commission was taking the subject of player protection seriously and added: "The commission is doing its work and the government is doing its work in reviewing an act which is coming up to two decades old and which certainly does need looking at again to make sure that we have got the regulations and laws in place to ensure that we have proportionate regulation."

The debate followed a question from Lord Grade of Yarmouth asking what assessment the government had made of the William Hill penalty.

Lord Parkinson said the government would not comment on individual enforcement cases but added: "We have however continued to see too many cases of operators failing adequately to protect their customers.

"The Gambling Act review will include a range of policies to strengthen protections further and we will publish a white paper in the coming weeks."

The delays to the white paper were picked up by shadow spokesperson for health and social care Baroness Merron who said that whenever ministers were asked about the date of its publication, peers had then found it was "shelved repeatedly".

She asked: "When the white paper is published will it have real teeth or will it be severely watered down as is widely predicted?"

Lord Parkinson said the government was looking at the issue "carefully".

He added: "There is a new secretary of state [Lucy Frazer] and a new minister responsible [Stuart Andrew] who obviously want to make sure that they give it the attention that it deserves and we want to get the balance right between protecting people's freedom and giving protections that people need."

Much-anticipated gambling review white paper looks set for further parliamentary delay   

William Hill hit with record £19.2m penalty by gambling regulator  

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