Examination of Witnesses (Questions 240
- 259)
THURSDAY 8 JANUARY 2004
PROFESSOR MARK
GRIFFITHS, DR
EMANUEL MORAN
AND PROFESSOR
JIM ORFORD
Q240 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
You have anticipated my second question precisely.
Professor Orford: My last point—and
this is a really important point—is that nobody—and
this is Mark Griffiths' area of expertise, I know—has mentioned
the rate for adolescents. All the evidence from this country (the
survey here) and the United States and elsewhere is that there
is a negative correlation between age and problem or pathological
gambling. The 16-24 year olds had the highest rate in our group,
and if you take that down to the group we did not look at (because
they were under 16s), adolescents, all the evidence is that the
prevalence rate there is the highest. Surprisingly. I was surprised
when I started to find out this. I do not know if Mark would agree,
but probably the best evidence is Susan Fisher's evidence, of
10,000 pupils between the ages of 12 and 15 in 100 schools across
England and Wales, finding a prevalence rate of over 5 per cent.
So there are several factors. I do not think we should continue
to say that Britain has a low rate of problem gambling. It does
not.
Professor Griffiths: On this 99
per cent figure that is always used, I do have to echo that the
vast majority out there simply do not gamble or gamble on the
activities that we know really are not problematic. We know that
a bi-weekly National Lottery ticket does not cause immense problems
for loads of people. It you looked at, for instance, slot-machine
players who define themselves as slot-machine players, and looked
at the prevalence of problem gambling in those individuals, it
would be a lot higher than the 0.6 to 0.8 per cent you are mentioning.
As you say, if you take age into account as well, if you look
at males aged between 16 to 25 who play slot-machines, you will
find that the proportion of problem gambling is very, very high.
It is a significant public health concern, as Professor Orford
has pointed out.
Q241 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
You think there should be a new gambling Prevalence Survey, which
was hinted at by Lord McIntosh when he gave evidence to us before
Christmas, in order to bring the figures up to date. If such a
survey is conducted, do you think it s necessary to define much
better the problems one is looking at and to look at age and different
activities?
Professor Griffiths: I think prevalence
surveys are a useful tool but prevalence studies do not tell us
a lot. They certainly do not tell us anything theoretically about
gambling. All they can provide is some benchmark data, which is
useful for informing public policy on a particular issue. I reckon
that if you did the prevalence survey again now, from the one
that was done in 2000 you would find very minor differences. Okay,
you might find a couple of per cent increase in terms of people
playing slot-machines, or a few per cent down in terms of playing
the National Lottery. It would be much better to do one post de-regulation,
to see the real effects in terms of what de-regulation will do
to this country in terms of problem and social gambling.
Q242 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
Or look at the areas which are opposed to de-regulation and look
at what the problems are there.
Professor Griffiths: Yes. There
are obviously some areas which we know, even since the year 2000—for
instance, internet gambling, spread betting—have caught
on dramatically. Those figures will be dramatically different.
Obviously those particular areas, where we know there is a particular
new form of gambling that has come in, would be interesting to
look at. My guess is that if you did an identical prevalence survey
tomorrow, using the same kind of things that we used in 2000,
you would not find a massive difference in people's gambling behaviour
at the moment.
Professor Orford: I would have
said the same until I reminded myself exactly when the first survey
was done. It will be five years later this year. Most of the data
was collected late in 1999. We always said and everybody associated
with it said we ought to do this every five years
Q243 Chairman: Should the Government
pay for that?
Professor Orford: Yes.
Dr Moran: I agree with everything
my colleagues have said but I would make one point. I would remind
the Committee the incidence of schizophrenia is 1 per cent but
nobody in this room would seriously suggest that it is not a very
serious problem.
Q244 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
Each of our distinguished witnesses has mentioned the word "habit"
several times. I apologise if I am asking you to simplify a complicated
question too much. What level of probability that a habit will
be formed would you expect if, let us say, 10 people went for
the first time into a place where there was gambling?—and
I accept that machines are more addictive than others. What proportion
of that ten people would be likely to form a habit? When the habit
is formed, what level of difficulty, compared with other addictions,
would you expect to break that habit?
Professor Griffiths: I do not
know about my colleagues but I think that is almost an impossible
question to answer—and maybe that was a deliberately hard
question. I would take you back to what habits are all about.
I have always argued that almost any behaviour is potentially
addictive because addictions really rely on constant rewards.
If constant rewards are not there, you cannot possibly become
addicted to something. It is one of the reasons why I have argued,
for instance, on a bi-weekly lottery, that no one is going to
become addicted to something that you play only twice a week.
A slot-machine, where you can play 12 times a minute, is a very
different kettle of fish. This is something where people can be
rewarded financially, socially, psychologically every few seconds,
and that is why people develop these habits. That is why habits
are reinforcing and they lead to various addictive behaviours.
Trying to say what percentage of individuals when they first go
into an arcade will become "addicted", is an incredibly
hard thing to do without knowing what the person's vulnerabilities
are to start with, knowing more about the general population.
I would be surprised if any one of my colleagues here would be
able to answer that question.
Q245 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
I am sorry about the level of difficulty. We are concerned obviously
about machines, as has already been expressed. The idea now that
gambling is just a leisure activity, another mainline leisure
activity, gives us all concern where young people are concerned.
We want to get some idea, with the new de-regulation in prospect,
what increase in the gambling habit are we likely to see among
young people.
Dr Moran: To a certain extent,
I agree: I think it is an impossible question really to answer
honestly. It is a bit like: How long is a piece of string? I think
we have to highlight the fact that in gambling you have a particular
form of activity which functions on the basis of what psychologists
refer to as operant conditioning; in other words, in terms of
reward. The schedule of rewards is on the basis, again, of what
psychologists refer to as intermittent variable ratio reinforcement;
in other words, there is a reward which appears intermittently.
Each time you do it, there is not a reward. It does occur, but
it does not occur regularly. It is unpredictable. That schedule
of intermittent variable ratio reinforcement is well-known, has
been known for decades, to be the best system of habit formation.
It is the basis upon which we all operate. If you phone your girlfriend
every night, she gets bored with you. If you stop phoning her,
she loses interest. The important thing is to phone intermittently
and unpredictably. That is what gambling is all about.
Lord Faulkner of Worcester: That is very
helpful.
Lord Mancroft: Very helpful.
Chairman: In other words, you are saying
you cannot win! That is the point.
Q246 Lord Mancroft: Accepting what
you have said, one of the areas on which we have been focusing
and about which we are concerned is young people—and children
in arcades, for example, is the obvious thing. With my interest
in drugs and alcohol, we in our field—and I think you would
agree with this—generally have the view that the younger
children are when starting to use drugs or alcohol, the more likely
they are to have problems later on. Is that true with gambling?
I think I know the answer to that but I would like to hear it
from you. The fact that AWP machines in arcades are not the most
exciting things in the world and they are not really great reward
givers, are they a factor, for those kids who play them, in those
kids growing up to have gambling problems?
Professor Griffiths: In answer
to your first question, I know of at least four independent studies
that have shown that the younger you start the more likely you
are to have problems—even within the adolescent period.
I did a study way back in 1990 showing that those kids who started
playing slot-machines at the age of nine years of age or below
were significantly more likely to have problems than those who
started at the age of 12 or above, and I have seen another three
surveys in this country alone which have actually replicated that
particular finding. The interesting thing and, I suppose, the
good news for adolescents is we know that with all, what I would
call, risky but rewarding behaviours, the peak use, whether for
drugs, alcohol or gambling, does peak in adolescence and young
adulthood. You will find a lot of adolescents will mature out
and spontaneously remit, and when they take on other things in
their life, job, first baby, marriage, for instance, the problem
gambling will often disappear. It is quite obvious that when you
ask problem gamblers about their history of gambling they will
have said they started in adolescence, but that does not mean,
we know for a fact, that all people who have had problems in adolescence
go on to be problem adult gamblers. We know for a fact that the
prevalence rates of problem gambling in adolescence are at least
twice as high as they are in adults. We know for a fact, even
though this is a very vulnerable population, that the good news
is a lot of it drops out. The gaming industry and the Government
might turn round and say, "Well, if behaviour does drop out,
why should we worry?" The reason we worry—and I am
talking about kids—is because when you have, say, an 11
year old who for six years suffered educationally, got themselves
a criminal record, et cetera because of their behaviour, that
has affected them for the rest of their life, even though by 18
they may have got it completely out of their system. There is
no doubt that some people do graduate. For instance, I followed
25 people through a three-year period. Only three people out of
that 25 graduated on to other forms of gambling. They were all
slot-machine players and the thing that they said got them off
slot-machines is that the rewards, as you were pointing out, were
not high enough. In the end the jackpot on an AWP machine is not
something that intrinsically is going to keep people motivated
or rewarded. When you introduce things like unlimited prizes,
that is a good acquisitional factor to keep people gambling in
the first place. AWP machines, although they are called "amusement
with prizes" machines, are still gambling machines, and to
young people, as far as I am concerned, they are still as addictive
as any other slot-machine basically because of things like the
operant conditioning process we have outlined, it becomes a repetitive
habit pattern. At the end of the day, the jackpot prize, for instance,
is most important in why people first start to play an activity.
It is not necessarily the main motivating factor that actually
keeps people developing and maintaining that activity.
Dr Moran: Could I very much support
that. From my written evidence, this is something I am particularly
concerned about. It does seem to me that the period when in Britain
we decided it was okay for children to play gaming machines was
a time when it was not really understood some of the evidence
that Professor Griffiths is talking about. We now do know that
slot-machines are potentially addictive. We do know that they
are particularly attractive for adolescents. The Budd Committee
report stated very clearly, you will remember, their instincts
were absolutely against allowing any kind of machine-playing for
under 18 year olds. I have not looked at the NOP survey, but I
have seen reports in the press that they asked 1,000 people around
the country what their view was, and 82 per cent said they were
against children being allowed to play machines of the low stake,
low prize type. It does seem to me that the Government now has
a responsibility to protect young people which 20 or 30 years
ago it was not so clear. It is clear now. I would wish to argue
very strongly that it is wrong for Britain to continue to do something
which as far as we can make out no other country that has rules
at all allows. I was told by a minister in DCMS that Finland allows
playing at the age of 15, but that was the only country that has
rules that the minister could actually find, apart from Britain,
that allows this playing. I think it is quite wrong that they
continue to be called "amusement with prizes".
Q247 Viscount Falkland: On this question
of the "amusement with prizes" machines, Lord McIntosh
told us when he came to give evidence that those who wanted to
abolish what had existed for many, many years would have to do
a bit of research—the research has clearly been done, as
you have shown to us—and show what harm they are doing before
they will be convinced that this business should be cut out. We
have very little time to convince Government—and I sense
that my colleagues on this Committee are pretty well convinced
that this is a dangerous area which needs to be looked at, and,
if not curtailed completely, something has to be done. Would you
just add a rider to what you have already said about this question.
If it is allowed to continue as it is at present, without any
break on it, would you expect our gambling rates to be higher
instead of lower than the rest of the English-speaking world,
for example?
Dr Moran: Chairman, Hippocrates
said "Life is short, the art long, experience is fallacious."
The point really is that when you have the experience that we
are being told about—namely that there are children playing
fruit machines and yet the prevalence does not seem to have gone
up—we have to see this in the social context. I agree with
all that my colleagues have said, and I would remind the Committee
that the availability of fruit machines to children over the last
few decades has been in a setting of a public policy of unstimulated
demand for gambling. That is a very crucial aspect of the whole
situation. Certainly my experience and that of my colleagues is
that a lot of the young people who get involved in fruit machines
in the early/mid teens grow out of it. But then of course a lot
of young people get into mischief and grow out of it anyway. I
think one of the reasons they have grown out of it is because
of the social climate. The Government is now proposing a free
for all, abandonment of the policy of unstimulated demand, and
I would certainly forecast that in that setting a lot of these
young people who drop it will shoot into further disturbance in
terms of pathological gambling.
Q248 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
How important is it, do you think, that the children are gambling
in arcades where their parents are playing higher value machines?
What is the effect of watching perhaps their parents or their
parents' friends in the reserved area where the high value machines
are being played? What effect does that have?
Professor Orford: It has been
said that it is protective to have a parent there. But you can
equally argue that it is quite the opposite—as seems to
be the case. One of the vulnerability factors is the modelling,
the demonstrating of gambling behaviour by a parent who also gambles.
Being taken into an amusement arcade by a parent, seeing a parent
playing a machine, seeing a parent win on a machine, seeing the
excitement associated with winning is likely actually to model
habitual gambling behaviour rather than protecting a person against
gambling behaviour. I do not think having a parent present is
necessarily a protective factor at all.
Chairman: We are going to move on to
what effect the parent will have on problem gambling and changes
that are going to be made.
Q249 Lord Walpole: The NERA Economic
Consultants have reported that the Bill will result in up to one
million—so this is not a percentage, it is a number—problem
gamblers in the UK, representing a three to four-fold increase
from the current level. Do you agree with this estimate?
Professor Griffiths: I would say
it is plausible. Again, always trying to put a figure on this
is very hard to do. I think Professor Orford and I have both mentioned
in our writings about something called the "availability
hypothesis". Basically, where you increase opportunity and
access to gambling, not only do you increase the number of regular
gamblers but you will also increase the number of problem gamblers.
I have gone on record as saying that may not be proportional.
Tessa Jowell was quoted as saying that a 50 per cent increase
in turnover of gambling would not lead to any increase in problem
gambling whatsoever. I find the mathematics of that unbelievable.
I certainly believe that where there is wide de-regulation and
massive increased opportunity to gamble, you will get people gambling
who have never gambled before. That is not to say they will necessarily
become problem gamblers but you will see an increase in problem
gambling as a result of massive de-regulation. Whether it is three
or four times, however . . . But I do not know how they came to
that particular figure, but it seems plausible.
Professor Orford: I would agree.
I do not think there is anybody who has looked at gambling who
thinks other than the increased availability will lead to increased
problems. The Australian productivity report, which is much the
most thorough report, which has looked very carefully at that,
came to that conclusion. I think one million is a figure plucked
out of the air, to be honest. But suppose it was a 50 per cent
increase, from a public health point of view—and my main
argument is that I want the Government to see this from a public
health point of view, which I do not think they are at the moment—a
50 per cent increase in any rate of disorder in society, putting
it up to half a million, would be tremendously significant.
Chairman: I want to bring in Jeff, because
you have mentioned Australia.
Q250 Jeff Ennis: Are there any conclusions
we can draw from comparisons with other countries, in terms of
what we need to learn in bringing in new legislation here?—particularly
the Australian model.
Professor Griffiths: I think there
are always things to learn from other countries. However, the
one caveat I would put on that is that every country has a different
culture of gambling. You can look at prevalence surveys in other
countries and ask yourselves why some countries seem to have higher
prevalence rates than us. I actually think, even though abroad
we are seen as a nation of gamblers, that we have a very strict
regime in place which has actually minimised the amount of problem
gambling amongst the adult population compared with other countries.
In Australia recently they have had a massive casino expansion
and they have suddenly seen a massive increase in the amount of
problem gambling. They have put internet gambling out. They have
had a moratorium on that because they have seen a massive increase
in that. In Australia, if people want to go to gamble, they actually
have to travel quite a long distance to do it; we live in a country
where we have 60 million people all crammed into this little space
and it is not very far for anybody to travel to gamble in this
country. I think, once de-regulation occurs, the opportunities
for and access to gambling will be like no other country really.
I cannot think of another country . . . Take somewhere like Canada,
which has also had a massive gambling explosion, they only have
half our population in a country that geographically is so much
bigger than ours. You cannot always compare like with like. Every
country I have looked at that has de-regulated in a big way has
seen an increase in problem gambling, and I do not see why that
should not occur here, but there will be a different culture in
terms of what people will enjoy gambling on. We only have 120
or so casinos in this country. If that number tripled, for instance,
I would expect, because of that type of particular gambling, that
it would attract a new clientele and there would be new problem
gamblers as a result of that particular type of activity.
Professor Orford: At the other
end of the scale, Sweden is a country with what looks like very
tight regulation on gambling and a more restricted range of types
of gambling in Sweden. The Government is much more heavily involved
in actually running gambling facilities and so on. So you have
Australia at one end, I think, as Professor Griffiths has described,
and Sweden at the other end and very tightly regulated.
Q251 Jeff Ennis: May I ask one supplementary,
Chairman, going back to the effects on adolescents and the attraction
of machines, et cetera. Do we have any evidence now, because of
the enormous expansion in home entertainment—computer games,
X-boxes and that sort of thing, to which a lot of young lads in
particular are drawn—that that sort of home entertainment
facility is having any effect on the potential for problem gambling
either one way or the other?
Professor Griffiths: I have spent
as many years studying things like video game addiction as I have
slot-machine addiction. It is quite obvious that there is an overlap
between the kind of people who get heavily involved in playing
video games and heavily involved in playing slot-machines. Sue
Fisher, again, has also done a lot of work on that in this country.
The good news if you are addicted, for instance, to a home video
game console is that the financial consequences are a lot less.
If I am playing 12 hours a day on a home video console, the financial
consequences are minimal compared with playing 12 hours a day
on a slot-machine, although behaviourally it might be doing the
same thing, basically, playing game after game, playing for long
periods of time. I have always argued that the philosophy of both
players is exactly the same: to stay on the machine for as long
as possible, using the least amount of money. Fortunately, slot-machines
are very expensive to play whereas video games are a lot cheaper.
Even if you play in a video game arcade, you can make 20 pence
or 50 pence last a long time if you are a very skilful player.
The people who are supposedly skilful on slot-machines will not
get anywhere near that in terms of time. There is, I think, a
large cross-over between the types of people who become addicted
to video games and those who become addicted to slot-machines.
Jeff Ennis: Thank you, Chairman.
Viscount Falkland: That was an interesting
point you made about the distance to travel and the effect that
has on this. In visiting France, I have noted in the past there
has been a prohibition on having casinos in the Paris area, and
only having them in holiday resorts, for example. In this country
we are seeing it in terms of the spread of betting opportunities
where we have areas of high density of population. Would you see
that as a concern that needs to be addressed, for example, in
Manchester, Glasgow, Liverpool, areas of high concentration like
that, and that the local authorities should take cognisance of
the fact that they should make it more difficult for people to
go to casinos by extending the distance between them? It is a
question, is it not, of trying to persuade people not to proliferate
in particularly high density areas?
Professor Griffiths: I think,
again, it is a difficult issue. Could I just state for the record
that I am not anti-gambling and I certainly do not want to stop
adults doing what they want to do. If people want to go to casinos,
that is absolutely fine by me. But, in all of this, whatever you
do, there is always going to be a price to pay. If a mega-casino
opens in Blackpool, my predictions would be that in the indigenous
population of Blackpool you will see a rise in the number of problem
gamblers who actually live in that locality, because they will
have increased opportunity and access—basically because
of a huge casino being open probably 24 hours a day. There is
also the point that people will flock in, do an activity as part
of a legitimate leisure activity, have a wonderful time in Blackpool,
maybe come away having won, and that will be exported. It is not
then going to Blackpool every night, but, having experienced what
they have experienced there, it can be exported back to the towns
and small places where they live if there is a gambling facility
there. For the vast majority of people, it will be nothing but
fun and exciting and a good time out, but, again, I do predict
that you will see an increase in problem gambling within the local
city or town or locality where those mega-casinos are located,
plus for some people who have never even gambled before it will
be exported back to where they live. That, again, will be to do
with the availability hypothesis: it is because of increased access
and opportunity.
Dr Moran: I agree with my colleagues
about this. I am not against gambling, I do it myself, but the
point really is that, in view of the nature of gambling, when
you participate in any type of activity it is vital that this
should be a conscious decision which you have decided. In a free
society, it is obviously highly appropriate that if people want
to gamble they should be allowed to do so. What is tending to
happen and will undoubtedly happen much more post-legislation
is that people will stumble on it. It is very much a characteristic
of internet gambling. If you look at the Times or the broadsheets
on the internet, at the top there is a free bet: Why not have
a go? This is the insidious aspect of the whole situation. But
gambling by its very nature must be treated with respect. That
does not mean to say that it should be banned or it should be
avoided, but it must be treated with respect. Then you are far
less likely to get into difficulties. Many of the proposals that
are incorporated in the draft Gambling Bill, while on the one
hand are saying we want "destination gambling"—and
that is a term which is commonly used in the proposed legislation—in
practice the situation will be one in which people will stumble
on it. And that is the danger.
Chairman: We will come back to that in
a moment. Lord Walpole will come back to this issue of stimulation.
Q252 Lord Walpole: Is the existing
policy of unstimulated demand a necessary component of good gambling
regulation, or can the Bill succeed in giving the industry more
freedom to stimulate demand and also maintain low levels of problem
gambling?
Professor Orford: I am assuming
that we are now into an era where unstimulated demand is a thing
of the past. We are into some degree of stimulation in demand.
The question, it seems to me is how do we get a balance whereby
we do not increase the negative side, as you have said, too much.
There are three areas I want to raise. One is something that I
suppose would come under the heading of advertising standards.
It does seem to me important that in society the gambling industry
advertises its products fairly. One of the things I am worried
about now, in the light of all that we have said here, is those
"amusement with prizes". If the Government is determined
that this anomaly should continue of child gambling, I think it
should be called as such. I do not think people should be induced
to play gaming machines by saying this is not gambling at all,
these are actually amusements. I would claim that is actually
contrary to advertising standards. Similarly, anything which claims
that a form of gambling that is clearly not a matter of skill
is actually a matter of skill, would, it seems to me, be against
advertising standards. Anything that unfairly promotes gambling
I would think should not be correct. The other thing is about
undue inducements. I would have thought this is a matter of reputation
of the gambling industry. We are told that the gambling industry
has a good reputation in this country and has done for a number
of years, and I think that is correct, but it does seem to me
that if the gambling industry were to follow some of the things
that we are told have happened in other countries it would lose
that reputation. For example, I understand that in other countries
free alcohol is provided in casinos. I would interpret that, and
I am sure some other people would interpret that, as getting people
intoxicated in order to more easily take money off them. I would
have thought a gambling industry would rapidly get a bad reputation
if it does that. I would have thought that was undue inducement.
The other area to which I would call attention is to do with credit,
because inherent in the habitual nature of gambling is the chasing
of losses and a lot of people put that central to the idea of
developing a problem with gambling. There is the idea of accumulating
your winnings and not having your winnings paid to you before
you bet again. Psychologically, it seems to me, it is bad and
it is encouraging problem gambling to say to somebody, "Do
you want your winnings? Or shall I keep them for you to bet again?"
I think it is important that people get their winnings back each
time, before they then make the choice to bet again. Personally,
I think credit cards are dangerous. We live in a society now where
credit card debt is a major national problem, so I would have
thought allowing people to bet with credit cards was a bad thing.
I do not think there should be cash machines anywhere near where
you actually gamble: I think you should have to go a distance
in order to get fresh cash. I think there should be methods whereby
you are given feed-back about the amount you are gambling and
you should be able to state a limit at the beginning of gambling
and be told whether you are near to exceeding that limit or not.
Those are just examples, but there is a whole set of things which
I think comes under the area of credit and the way money is transacted
in gambling, because all those things are central to the idea
of how you develop habitual gambling.
Q253 Lord Walpole: Do you think one-armed
bandits should have health warnings on them—like a packet
of cigarettes?
Professor Griffiths: I certainly
think people should be informed of what the pay-back rates are
on the machine, and it would be a good idea to give them a running
total of how much they have spent. I would say about slot-machines
and gambling in general that we can all make conscious decisions
beforehand about what we are doing to do and that this is our
spending limit, but, as a person who plays slot-machines a lot
in the name of research, I can tell you now that when you are
actually playing on a slot-machine—and I sit here knowing
all the probabilities, I know all about them—when I am in
mid-action playing a slot-machine, all of that goes totally out
of the window. You are totally in action, basically adrenaline
is running round your body, and all those rational decisions you
make are completely gone when you are actually in the gambling
situation. A lot of problem gamblers will say that when they are
in the gambling situation there are in a dissociated state: they
do not actually feel they are the body they were. I have done
it myself. I am not a problem gambler at all, but I know for a
fact that I can feel out of myself and feel totally in escape
mode when I am engaged in a particular form of gambling. That
is the problem, even when you educate people—and I would
like to think I am an educated person. It is like being under
the influence of alcohol: when I have had a few drinks, I know
what the effects are but my behaviour may be totally different
and irrational when I am under the influence.
Q254 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
Could I ask Professor Orford to add to his list of possible ways
of breaking addictions on machines. In Australia, particularly
in Victoria, smoking is now prohibited in the poker arcades for
two reasons. One is obviously for public health reasons and the
other is because it is seen as a way of interrupting the addiction.
Would you see that as a useful measure to be adopted?
Professor Orford: To ban smoking?
Q255 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
At the machines.
Professor Orford: The argument
for that I have not quite understood.
Q256 Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
If you need another cigarette, you will stop.
Professor Orford: It creates a
break. It would not be my number one factor. I can see the logic
of that, but it does not seem the most obvious thing to do.
Professor Griffiths: I think you
will find that people who really want to smoke more than they
want to play will obviously stay out and smoke rather than play.
We know for a fact that in Las Vegas people who drink a lot, for
instance, will not drink a lot while gambling, because it will
make them go to the toilet. They will either drink very short
drinks so they do not have to go to the toilet so often, or if
they get the urge they will urinate where they are on the seat.
It is a common thing in Las Vegas casinos to find under the chairs
big pools of urine from those people who are so into their gambling.
My guess is that most people are not going to put themselves in
that situation, so I agree with Jim, really, that the idea of
the smoking link is not necessarily a good one.
Dr Moran: I think more significant
is the presence of alcohol. Alcohol impairs judgment. It clearly
increases impulsivity. Therefore, the association between gambling
and alcohol is, I think, a very hazardous one.
Q257 Lord Mancroft: One of the features
of the Government's policy which at least will limit negative
social problems—and we have talked about this before but
I would like to come back to it again—is that they believe
destination gambling is better than casual gambling: the fact
that gambling is in one place and people have to go there to do
it will lessen the negative impacts. Do you think that is right?
We have talked about conscious decisions and there would need
to be a conscious decision to go to Blackpool or wherever it may
be to do it. Is that a factor?
Professor Griffiths: The problem
is that a whole load of things are going on at once. If you are
going to have destination resorts but also then increase the amount
that people can gamble on the internet through interactive television
or on their mobile phones, it makes the idea of destination gambling
somewhat redundant anyway. My guess is that for 99 per cent of
the people who go to a destination to gamble, like myself when
I go to Las Vegas or wherever, it is because I think I am going
to have a fun time. I do not go there to win money. If I win,
that is a bonus. When I go to my local casino in Nottingham, I
go there to have a meal, be with friends, have a talk or whatever
and the gambling is incidental. My guess is that for most people
who go to destination resorts that would be their aim, just to
have a fun time out. Yes, they may win some, they may lose some,
but the point is that this is not being done in isolation. Basically
de-regulation is occurring in lots of different areas and we now
have lots or remote forms of gambling that people can do. If I
wanted to, I could probably link up with the internet and sit
outside in this corridor and through my mobile phone gamble if
I want to. It makes the idea of a destination resort somewhat
redundant really. If this was the only thing that was happening,
then you might see it as a good thing, but the point is that de-regulation
is going on in lots of different spheres and not just in this
one aspect.
Q258 Chairman: This is an important
point. One of the things you have just said—and forgive
me if I have it wrong—is that if people go to a destination
resort to enjoy the fun of gambling, that is why people would
go. If you simply want to gamble, you do not need to go there
at all.
Professor Griffiths: Yes.
Q259 Chairman: There is a very clear
difference between the two forms.
Professor Griffiths: I am sure
there is for some people. But it was also my argument, as I was
saying before, that you get those people who just want to go for
the fun element, but when they get there and they are in gambling
mode then irrationality can creep in as well. Thankfully, for
most people it is not going to be something they are going to
lose control of. I love going in big casinos around the world—I
am sure most people do—I am not anti them at all, but where
you introduce lots of big casinos everywhere you will increase
the amount of gambling.
Dr Moran: In the whole notion
of destination gambling, I think in a very similar way throughout
this whole business of this new legislation, there is an awful
lot of confusion. The words "destination gambling" can
be used in more than one way. If I decide to go to a betting shop,
that is destination gambling. The Government at times uses it
in that way and at other times it talks about destination gambling
in terms of going to a future Blackpool, which is really going
to be the English version of Las Vegas. These two are totally
different ideas.
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