Gambling - Consultation | Funding of Gambling Commission.

In addition to the ongoing Review of the Gambling Act 2005, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has launched a consultation into the funding of the Gambling Commission.

The consultation, which will run until 25 March 2021, proposes an uplift to Gambling Commission fees based on proposals from the Gambling Commission to the Government. Amongst the proposals is an increase in new application fees by 60% and an increase in Operating Licence annual fees of between 55% and 72%.

In the consultation, which can be read here, it states:

“The Commission is experiencing new challenges in regulation which are expected to grow in significance in coming years:

• Increased technological developments including product and payment innovation.
• Changes in the size and shape of the market partially caused by consolidation, meaning the operators it regulates are increasingly global operators.
• Increasing risks associated with unlicensed operators and the need to protect consumers and the industry from ‘black market’ encroachment.”

In response to these ‘challenges’, the proposed responses (which will be funded by fee increases) are:

“Key elements of the proposed response to Challenge 1:

• More specialist technical staff, including a Chief Product Officer (CPO), to understand and translate the impact of technological changes, and staff with technical and investigative expertise.
• Investing in tools to improve its approach to compliance.
• Developing its approach to making better use of the wealth of data available.

Key elements of the proposed response to Challenge 2:

• More staff whose focus is on driving the international regulatory agenda, and working with international regulatory partners and agencies.
• More specialist staff to interrogate and understand complex corporate structures.
• Increased legal capacity to defend positions.

Key elements of the proposed response to Challenge 3:

• More staff to proactively and systematically identify the scale of illegal gambling.
• More resources to robustly tackle illegal gambling, including increased legal capacity for prosecutions.”