BGC Publishes New Code Handbook on Fifth Anniversary

STANDARDS body The Betting and Gaming Council has published its first Code Handbook, comprising 20 Codes covering 100 measures all members commit to as part of the industry’s continued drive to raise standards.

The new Code Handbook – published to mark the BGC’s fifth anniversary – collates every voluntary commitment BGC operator’s sign up to as a condition of membership, including the BGC’s overarching Code of Conduct.

While three of the Codes have now become part of License Conditions and Codes of Practice (LCCP) for members, the vast majority of these commitments go beyond license requirements set by the independent regulator, the Gambling Commission.

As well as these measures – which have already been implemented across the BGC’s diverse and growing membership – the BGC is also working closely with government and the regulator on over 50 additional workstreams to further raise standards following the publication of the White Paper last year.

Those include frictionless enhanced spending checks online, an industry Ombudsman to improve customer redress and expanding the scope of the Bank Transfer Block project to offer customers even more control of their spending.

The vast majority of the measures are around safer gambling, including core pledges on advertising and messaging, the promotion of safer gambling tools and signposting help and support to those who need it.

These measures apply across the diverse membership of the BGC, including land-based operators like casinos, which are a pillar of the hospitality and tourism sector, bookmakers on hard-pressed high streets and world leading online gaming operators.

Betting and Gaming Council CEO Grainne Hurst said: “I am delighted to announce this new Code Handbook, which comprises over five years of determined work to raise standards, across the board.

“It is also entirely fitting that we publish this landmark new Code Handbook on our fifth anniversary. The BGC was founded as the industry’s standards body, and this Handbook draws together our sector’s combined efforts, under the leadership of the BGC, to raise standards on safer gambling in the UK.

“With 20 Codes covering 100 measures, which all BGC members follow as a condition of membership, this comprehensive document should rightly be seen as the concrete demonstration of our member’s determination to deliver world-class standards.

“This Code Handbook is also not the final word on this work, because the commitment to raising standards does not stop for the BGC, or our members.

“That’s why we are working with the regulator and government on over 50 additional workstreams which will raise standards even further as part of the White Paper reforms.

“Taken alone, neither the recently published White Paper on gambling reform, or existing license conditions set by the Gambling Commission, can deliver the world class standards our industry strives for.

“It takes independent determination on behalf of our members, and collective ambition by the BGC to deliver that. This Handbook is the result of that determination and ambition.

“We are determined to deliver the foundations for a sustainable sector, built on stability, growth and diversity, ensuring our members set the global standard for our world-class industry.”

The BGC stressed these incredibly high standards are only found in the regulated sector, unlike the growing unsafe, unregulated gambling black market.

A recent study commissioned by the BGC found 1.5m Brits are annually staking up to £4.3bn with unsafe, illegal, unregulated black market operators, which don’t pay tax, don’t contribute to the economy or sport and do not hold the same rigorous high standards on safer gambling.

The Code Handbook includes measures like the whistle-to-whistle ban on TV betting commercials during live sport before the 9pm watershed, which led to the number of such ads being seen by children at that time falling by 97%.