The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is investigating online gambling firms about the ways they have been screwing gamblers over and breaching Consumer Protection Law.

Deceptive sign-up and bonus offers with unfair and non-transparent terms and conditions are pure evil. It takes a matter of seconds to deposit cash into a remote gambling site, but it can take days and sometimes weeks to withdraw funds. Players can “reverse” the withdrawal while it is still being processed which encourages gamblers to blow their winnings – something known as “the curse of the reverse”!

All this is bad enough but most of these firms went offshore to places like Gibraltar to avoid tax and strong regulations. Here the Gambling Commission is supposed to enforce the licensing objective that gambling is “fair and open”, but has failed to do so.

The Remote Gambling Association (RGA) is the body set up by the predatory online gambling firms to help them get away with screwing gamblers over. The head of that body is Clive Hawkswood, one of the parasites making a living from these screwed over gamblers.

The RGA has drafted “Fair, Honest, Safe and Fun – the case for cross border gambling in the EU”. It concludes that gambling is a “leisure” market activity and implies that the RGA is acting on behalf of consumers as there is a high demand for gambling.

Of course, this is all false. It is the supply and the deceptive offers that creates gambling demand and gambling is not a harmless leisure activity.  

It doesn’t take an economist to work out that if billions are lost on remote gambling sites and some of that cash is going offshore where it isn’t taxed, there is a negative impact on the economy. It’s time for Theresa May to crackdown on the remote gambling racket.

Content produced and sponsored by Campaign for Fairer Gambling