38 Degrees Petition for Release of Report into Reforming the Gambling Industry

This is another petition from the internet democracy organisation I’ve got absolutely no problem signing. People are succumbing to addiction and suicide because of the industry. And I also remember how, back during Blair’s tenure of No. 10, there were briefly plans for gambling megacentres. One of them was going to be Blackpool, which was going to be Britain’s Las Vegas. These were mercifully dropped. Nevertheless, television and the internet are saturated with adverts for online gambling, there have been concerns about a specific type of one-armed bandit or something like it in betting shops and documentaries about the toll gambling addiction has taken in broken lives.

Content warning: this email contains mentions of suicide and addiction.

Dear David,

Four years. Five different ministers. And an estimated 1,600 deaths. [1] That’s how long it’s been since the Government announced they’d be drawing up plans to reform the gambling industry and make it safer. But delay after delay has stopped those plans being published – and with every delay comes real danger. [2]

But during these years of waiting Annie, who lost her husband to gambling related suicide, has worked tirelessly to ensure the Government publishes these plans. [3] They’re long overdue. In fact, the rules regulating the gambling industry haven’t been properly updated since before the smartphone was invented. [4]

There’s rumours that the report could finally be released early next month, but we’ve heard that before. This time, Annie is determined to make sure it happens. So she’s travelling to 10 Downing Street to hand in her petition calling on the Government to finally set out the action it’ll take to protect people affected by gambling.

Over 83,000 of us have already signed Annie’s petition. Will you sign the petition today and help Annie get to 100,000 signatures by Monday? We can’t all be with Annie in person, but we can lend her our names – and our support:

SIGN THE PETITION

“The idea that he was being encouraged and rewarded for doing something that would potentially kill him is hard to swallow. If there had been interventions on the gambling sites, rather than incentives, then perhaps he would still be here… I don’t want what happened to Luke to happen to anyone else…The delays to the white paper mean there will be plenty more people suffering.” [5] – Annie

After struggling with gambling for years, Annie’s husband Luke was given “free bets” to encourage him to gamble during the pandemic. [6] If these gambling laws had been updated sooner – to stop inducements like free bets, to curb relentless advertising and ensure people don’t bet more than they can afford – hundreds of lives could’ve been saved.

Public Health England estimates there are more than 400 gambling-related suicides every year. [7] Every day another life is lost, another family is torn apart – and still the Government is delaying action to stop gambling suicides.

38 Degrees supporters – that’s people like you, reading this email – have forced the Government to clamp down on gambling giantsbefore. In 2018, we convinced the Government to reduce the maximum stake on betting machines in bookmakers from £100 to £2. [8] Together we can make them take action again.

So, will you sign Annie’s petition today and support her as she travels to Downing Street to deliver it in just a few days time?

SIGN THE PETITION

Thank you for being involved,

David, Megan, Robin and the 38 Degrees team

P.S.: If you or anyone you know are struggling with gambling, you can get support at Gamcare or by calling 0808 8020 133.

P.P.S: Annie originally started her petition on the Government website but after 6 months all petitions there are shut down, unlike 38 Degrees. 38 Degrees petitions will remain active for as long as you need them. If you wish to start a petition today, please click here.

NOTES:
[1] UK Government: The Rt Hon Lucy Frazer KC MP
IGB: Conservatives pledge Gambling Act review in manifesto
The Guardian: Bereaved families demand investigation of every UK gambling-linked suicide
[2] The Guardian: Dismay as UK gambling reform white paper shelved for fourth time
[3] 38 Degrees: Stop gambling suicides, publish the Gambling Act white paper
[4] BBC News: ‘Outdated gambling laws need urgent change’ – Lord Foster
[5] The Guardian: ‘I don’t want what happened to my husband happening to anyone else’: the widow campaigning for gambling law reform
[6] iNews: ‘My husband took his life after a free bet bonus sparked a gambling spiral during lockdown’
[7] See note 1
[8] 38 Degrees: Addictive gambling machines: Victory!‘

A Corbyn Government Would Have Defended People’s Rightful British Citizenship

This week the Tories once again took away more of the British people’s hard-won freedoms with the Nationality and Borders bill, proposed by Dominic Raab and the noxious Priti ‘Vacant’ Patel. This allows the government to strip a naturalised Brit of their citizenship, without giving notice to the person concerned. It follows the 2002 act that allowed the government to strip someone of British nationality so long as they had another. Then there’s the 2014 Immigration Act, pushed through by Tweezer when she was home secretary, that allows the government to strip someone of their citizenship, even if it left them stateless, so long as they could apply to another country for theirs. The Home Office decided that notifying the person affected could be done simply by putting it in their file if their whereabouts were unknown. The High Court ruled that this was insufficient, and so Patel has including legislation exempting the process from judicial review. Which has been described by Ian Dunt at inews as retrospective legislation denying people their right to appeal. It doesn’t matter how long the naturalised person has been here. They could have been here their entire lives, Patel and Raab can still strip them of their British nationality. This has been excused on the pretext that it would stop foreign criminals using human rights legislation to avoid deportation, particularly under the legislation protecting ‘the right to family life’. This is another Tory lie. Mike has pointed out that no foreign criminal has ever dodged deportation using that clause. The effect of the act is to turn immigrants into second-class citizens. This has chilling implications for the rest of us, because what Tony Benn said was true: the Tories start their attacks on people’s rights with immigrants before moving on to the settled population. But as this appears to target Blacks, Asians and channel migrants, it will inevitably be supported by racists.

It’s alarmed very many people. The increased restrictions on immigration have been criticised by a number of Jewish organisation, including Reform Judaism. They have stated that Jews who fled to Britain in the 1930s were not protected in 2021. According to Zelo Street, the Board of Deputies has expressed similar concerns. But Zelo Street has also pointed out that Patel’s and Raab’s wretched legislation particularly affects Jews because of Israel’s ‘Right of Return’. According to this, all Jews everywhere have the right to settle in Israel. Benjamin Netanyahu went further, and declared that every Jew around the world automatically had Israeli citizenship. This didn’t impress the growing number of Jews critical of Israel and its persecution of the Palestinians. One Jewish American said on the Net how ridiculous it was that he, who came from Anchorage in Alaska and had never been to Israel, had the right to settle their, while his friend, a Palestinian, was banned from entering his homeland. And the Israeli state certainly seems to share this sentiment when it comes to The Wrong Kind of Jews. There have been a number of instances where Jews, who have voiced criticisms of Israel, have been very quickly rounded up by the Israeli authorities and put on the next flight home when they’ve tried to enter the country. It’s obviously a case of all Jews being citizens of Israel, except for those that aren’t.

But the effect of Netanyahu’s wretched piece of legislation combined with Patel’s and Raab’s is that any Jew, who gained their British citizenship through naturalisation can now be stripped of it, as there is somewhere else they can go. The Street notes that despite all the screams about Corbyn and anti-Semitism, in reality genuine anti-Semitism comes from the far right. And this is the direction in which this government is moving. The Street concludes

‘That may not be the current intention of Ms Patel and her pals. But, with the certainty of night following day, after they come for the Muslims, the far-right come for the Jews.

And the far-right have now been quietly emboldened. Be afraid. Be very afraid.’

https://zelo-street.blogspot.com/2021/12/borders-bill-and-anti-semitism.html

Absolutely. But one other thing may be said about this vile piece of legislation and Britain’sJ ewish community:

It would never have been passed by a Corbyn government and Jews would have been protected.

Corbyn was never an anti-Semite. Indeed, he is one of the most anti-racist MPs and has spoken up in the House and elsewhere in support of the Jewish community. He was simply critical of Israel and its persecution of the Palestinians. But the militant Zionists, who denounced him and his supporters as Jew-haters don’t distinguish between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. As a result, Britain has been denied a government, which would have actively defended the rights of Jews alongside other ethnic groups. Instead we have an increasingly extreme right-wing Tory government, which is taking those rights away, alongside those of the mainstream, White, gentile population.

And unfortunately, this is a government that has the support of those who claim to represent Britain’s Jews. When Tweezer got in, she was congratulated by the Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis. Who was one of those pushing the anti-Semitism smears against Labour. Now, partly thanks to this smear campaign, British Jews are left vulnerable to real anti-Semitic persecution. All done perfectly legally by the next racist, who fancies his or her chances as the new Oswald Mosley.

The BUF also had women members, who used to go out goose-stepping to defend Britain from Communism. I wonder if Patel’s wardrobe contains the odd black shirt and jackboots?